


This Is Our Battle Cry

by FallenShandeh



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Destiel - Freeform, Doctor!Cas, Feels, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-24
Updated: 2014-07-02
Packaged: 2018-02-06 01:20:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 20
Words: 31,768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1839181
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FallenShandeh/pseuds/FallenShandeh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sammy's in hospital and Dean's beside himself with worry, but there's one thing distracting him. One of the student doctors in the trauma department is absolutely gorgeous. And he's a guy. Dean's straight, he's never found another male attractive in his LIFE, but this one is an exception.</p><p>Castiel Novak is distracted too. He's been working his butt off all his life to get to where he is, to the exclusion of all else, but now something else has forced its way into his life. The moment he laid eyes on Dean Winchester, he knew there was something very special about the guy. Whether it's the beautiful eyes or the hard-planed, masculine face, something about Dean has Cas acting like a lovesick teenage girl. Minus the giggling. Mostly.</p><p>A love of beer and a deeper love of cars bonds them and friendship begins. And then one thing leads to the next.</p><p>But all isn't simple and easy. This is one love story that doesn't have a happy ending.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Dean Winchester Has Perfect Eyes

**Author's Note:**

> I'm having fun writing this :D
> 
> I don't know Cas well so he's a bit OOC [hence the AU so it makes sense sort of]. I'm one episode into season 2 and then I jumped forward and am two episodes into season 4. Bad fangirl is bad and doesn't watch things in order.
> 
> It'll take a while to get to the fun parts because this Dean is 100% straight. Cas is just his exception. He'll take a little bit to get used to the idea of being attracted to a man. And then it'll get feelsy. Hopefully I can write well enough to do the story justice.
> 
> Sammy is 18 so Dean is 22, and Cas is brilliant so if at 26 he's a little young for a Resident med student just pretend he skipped a few years of school.

It wasn’t right. Tears in those gorgeous green eyes. Dean Winchester did not cry. Not over anything.  
“Sam will be fine,” Cas said, trying to be at once professional and soothing. “He’s asleep right now. We’ve run a lot of scans. He’s in shock and we’ll keep him in overnight for observation but we can’t see any reason why he couldn’t go home tomorrow.”  
“Doctor Novak.” Dean’s voice was hollow and worried. “Promise me.”  
“We don’t normally make promises, Dean,” Cas replied firmly, but when Dean bit his lip and looked down, he sighed and relented. “But in this case, yes, I promise your brother will be fine.”  
“Okay.”  
“You look like you need a drink,” Cas observed.  
“Fuck, I could drink a whole liquor store.”  
“But you won’t. Not while Sam is still in hospital.”  
“I have to look after him. God knows Dad won’t.”  
Cas nodded. He couldn’t pass judgement on that matter, but the whole town knew of John Winchester’s random, often extended absences, and nobody was shocked when one or the other of his sons sported bruises, fresh scrapes, or even, occasionally, cuts that should be stitched but never saw a doctor’s hand. “I understand. My shift ends in a few. I can hang around if you want. Give you someone to talk to.”  
“That… would be nice.” Uncertainty crossed Dean’s face. That was another emotion that didn’t belong there.  
“I have another patient to check up on before I clock off,” Cas said, “but I’ll be back soon. Alright?”  
“Yeah, okay.”

“Doctor, is something wrong?”  
Cas blinked. “What? No, of course not.”  
“You’ve taken my blood pressure four times.”  
Heat rose in Cas’s cheeks. “I’m sorry. I’m thinking about another patient. Car crash, drunk driver. It’s bad business.”  
“Is he okay?”  
Cas nodded. “It’s his brother I’m worried about. But I can’t talk about that, doctor-patient confidentiality, you know.”  
“Yes, dear,” the woman said. “I was a nurse when I was young.”  
In truth Cas was thinking about Dean’s beautiful eyes, his perfect lips, his wonderful everything… but there was no way in hell he was going to say any of that.  
Dragging his mind back to the task at hand, he finished taking the old lady’s vitals and smiled. “Everything looks great, Betty. If your blood pressure stays stable like this, you should be able to go home in just a few days.”  
“Oh, how wonderful.” Betty reached for his hand and took it in both of hers, kissing it softly. “You’re the best doctor I’ve ever had. Even if you’re a bit distracted.”  
Cas blushed again. “Thank you, ma’am. I hope you aren’t here on Monday.”  
“So do I, young man.” Betty’s toothless smile warmed Cas’s heart and he couldn’t help but smile widely at her as he backed out of her room.  
“Goodnight, Mrs Harper.”  
“Goodnight, Doctor!”  
Cas retreated to the locker room before someone could commandeer him for an emergency and then stretched until his back cracked before pulling his scrubs shirt off over his head and stuffing it into his backpack. He stood debating whether to bother changing properly for a few minutes, and then decided he might as well shower here. Thirteen hours on his feet meant he would most likely not make it past the couch when he got home.

After about five seconds under the pathetic showerhead, Cas gave up. The blood and other less savory fluids had been washed away already and showering at the hospital was not a pleasant experience. The water was either scalding hot or icy cold - Cas preferred the former - and there was next to no pressure, what with all the other things in the complex that demanded water.  
He cut the water and reached for his towel, drying off quickly and then walking back to his locker with his towel wrapped around his waist. There were no other doctors in here, still, which wasn’t all that unusual. Most of them avoided showering at work at all costs. He dressed quickly in jeans and a t-shirt and then stuffed his backpack back into his locker and left.

Dean was half-asleep, slumped over Sammy’s hospital bed. His head alternated between freaking out over Sam’s car crash and freaking out because he was not gay but damn, that doctor was hot.  
“Dean,” Sam rasped.  
Dean sat bolt upright, wiping at his face to try to make the evidence that he’d been crying go away. “Hey, Sammy.”  
“Where’s Dad?”  
“Away.” Dean couldn’t keep the scowl off his face. “And thank God for that, because Sam, if he was here…”  
“It wasn’t my fault, Dean!”  
“You think he cares whose fault it was? His car’s scrap, and you were driving.”  
“With his permission.”  
“Permission? Sammy, he doesn’t care about permission.” Dean sighed. “Look, I know I keep snapping. I just… I’m trying to figure out how to keep you safe.”  
“I know.” Sam patted his hand. “And I don’t want you to get hurt too.”  
Dean looked at his brother properly for the first time since Sam had been admitted here. Poor kid. He looked like he was in a lot of pain. “You need any more morphine?”  
“No, Dean, I’m not going to get morphine when I go home. What’s the point in having it here? It’s only one day.”  
“Don’t be a hero.”  
“I should say the same to you.”  
“Am I interrupting anything?” Doctor Novak’s deep, gravelly voice came from the doorway. Dean hastily shook his head.  
“No way, Sammy’s just being an idiot.”  
“Am not!”  
“Are too.”  
“Am not!”

Cas shook his head, smiling. “Wrestling is probably a bad idea, if either of you was considering it.”  
Dean looked at him incredulously, gorgeous eyes wide. “Of course not.”  
“Good,” Cas chuckled. “Do you plan on staying here all night, Dean?”  
“Yeah, probably.”  
“I suppose there’s no point in telling you Sam is in good hands.” He couldn’t stop himself from smiling. He didn’t even care if Dean only saw him as Sam’s doctor. He liked the guy.  
“None at all. Someone’s gotta look after Sammy. If Dad gave a damn, he wouldn’t let his son be alone in the hospital for a second.”  
Cas couldn’t stop himself from feeling sadness at Dean’s attitude towards his father. He didn’t know John well, and he had suspected for quite a long time that the man hit his sons, but he, like the rest of the town, had seen enough to know that for all his shortcomings, John Winchester certainly “gave a damn”. He wrenched his eyes away from his shoes and forced himself to look at Dean without his thoughts lingering on how perfect the green-eyed beauty’s face was. “I can stay and keep you company if you want. I’m off until Monday now.”  
“Don’t you want to get home?” Sam asked.  
“Not so much I can’t hang around here,” Cas said truthfully. Yes, he’d been here for thirteen hours already, but he had a very good incentive to stay here longer. He couldn’t get Dean’s stunning eyes out of his head.  
“It’s not that I don’t appreciate the offer, Doctor Novak-”  
“Cas.”  
“-Cas, but I hardly know you,” Dean said matter-of-factly. There was a little bit of fear in his eyes.  
Fear? But why? Cas had never thought of himself as intimidating. He’d never been found intimidating, to his knowledge. “Fair enough,” he replied with a smile. “I’m twenty-six, I’m a Resident in the trauma department here, and I drive a new Camaro.”  
Dean’s face lit up. “Nice. I always said my dream car was either a Camaro or Baby.”  
“Baby?” Cas sat down, his head tilted a little.  
“My sixty-seven Impala. Dad gave her to me when I was fifteen to fix up. She was a junker, but now she’s perfect.”  
Dean was so much more animated when he was talking cars. So much more beautiful. Cas smiled. “I’ve always liked classic cars. I don’t know nearly as much about them as I’d like to.”  
That got Dean chatting away about things Cas understood like brake pads and radiators, and then onto things Cas didn’t understand - CV joints and master cylinders and drive shafts - and he didn’t care that he didn’t understand a word, because Dean’s voice was hypnotic. He leaned forward in his chair, elbows on his knees and chin in his hands.  
After what felt like a few seconds, Dean looked up at the clock on the wall and swore. “Sorry! I didn’t mean to keep you so late, shit, it’s four A.M!”  
Cas blinked in surprise. “So it is. I didn’t notice.”  
“How do you not notice someone monologuing for six hours?”  
“Six and a half,” Cas corrected, smiling. “I was fascinated.”  
“You didn’t understand a word,” Dean accused.  
“Not one,” Cas admitted. “You speak well.”  
“I failed every single speech I had to do in school,” Dean said, laughing. “I do not speak well.”  
“I don’t know,” Cas said, smiling again. “I was captivated.”  
Dean’s cheeks flushed and the fear returned to his eyes. Cas wasn’t sure what to make of that, but he smiled anyway. “When your brother’s out of hospital, you want to go get a beer?”  
“Y-yeah,” Dean stammered. He cleared his throat. “Yeah. That sounds great.”  
Cas scrawled his phone number on a piece of paper and handed it to Dean. “Call me when they discharge him.”  
“Yeah. Okay.”


	2. Castiel Novak Hates Mondays

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fweeeeeee drama! :D

Monday came. Cas had spent the weekend studying to get his mind off waiting for Dean to call, but other than his little brother Gabe ringing to whine about girl trouble, Battle Cry hadn’t played in his house once. Not. Once.  
He groaned when his alarm went off. The air was cold and his bed was nice and warm. Getting up was impossible. But maybe Sam was still in hospital and that was why Dean hadn’t called. In that case, there was a good chance Cas might see one or the other of the brothers today.  
He hauled himself out of bed, gasping at the pre-dawn chill, and shuffled to the shower. He turned on the water and then leapt backwards with a yelp.  
“Cold!”  
Apparently the hot water system wasn’t working properly. Again. What was the use in paying crazy amounts of money to rent a house with an instant hot water system when it broke every month or two? He huffed, and then decided he needed to shower regardless of whether there was any hot water or not.  
The cold shower was hellish on such a frigid morning, and Cas’s Monday went from bad to worse when he burnt the hell out of his toast and discovered the milk had gone sour, so cereal was not an acceptable Plan B and coffee simply wasn’t going to happen.  
He gave up and slid into his car, hissing out an oath at the freezing leather of the seat.  
It wouldn’t start. He turned the key and there was no response.  
“Flat battery,” he muttered. “Must have left the lights on.”  
There was nothing for it. He was going to have to forgo breakfast and coffee altogether and walk. And hope that he wasn’t too late.  
It started raining as he walked out of the garage.  
Mondays.

“You’re sopping wet,” Betty Harper pointed out the moment Cas entered her room.  
“I’m damp,” he said with false levity. “I had a small technical issue crop up with my car this morning, so I walked. A little bit of rain never hurt anybody.”  
And he hadn’t taken his spare scrubs home to wash so he’d had nothing to change into.  
“You’ll catch a chill like that,” Betty said, fussing at his sleeve as he checked her blood pressure.  
“I’ll be fine.” Oddly, though he was a little disappointed Betty wasn’t ready to be discharged yet, it was nice to have her fuss over him like Mom used to. He finished taking her vitals and wrote them down on her chart. “Everything looks great. Your stitches come out tomorrow, is that why you’re still here?”  
“They thought it would save me coming back, dear. It’s a very long way for me, you know. I’m eighty.”  
Cas’s pager beeped the 911 code. He opened his mouth to explain to Betty that he had to go, now, but she shushed him with a look and chivvied him along with her hands. He turned and scrambled, reaching for his pager as he went.  
Room 402, new patient. Assault. Urgent surgery.  
Working in trauma was always interesting. No two days were the same. Assaults were both wonderful - new challenges with every patient - and horrific. Cas hated seeing what human beings could do to one another.  
He skidded to a stop outside the room and straightened his ID lanyard, then took a deep breath and pushed open the door.  
Sam Winchester stood at the bedside despite the nurses’ best efforts to get rid of him. That hurt, more because Sam was out of hospital and Dean hadn’t called than for any other reason. And then Cas got close enough to see the patient.  
The young man’s face might have been beaten almost beyond recognition and contorted into a snarl of pain but Cas would know those eyes anywhere. His heart damn near stopped and he shoved Sam and one of the nurses out of the way.  
His professionalism was stretched very thin, but he managed to keep an impartial façade. “Do you know where you are, Dean?”  
“Hospital,” Dean managed, though it obviously hurt to speak.  
“Yes, exactly. I’m going to examine you now. There’s an OR available in ten minutes but in the meantime I need to make sure we know exactly what we need to fix.” Cas started at the top. There was a nasty laceration to Dean’s scalp that needed stitches. Working his way slowly down, there was a possible fracture to the left cheekbone, and Dean’s jaw was broken in at least two places. Going on the sharp intake of breath when Cas pressed his fingers into the young man’s right collarbone, there was a good chance that he had a fracture there. He had several broken ribs and was obviously having difficulty breathing. Cas warmed his stethoscope in his hands and then gently pressed the metal to Dean’s chest. There was a crackly fluid sound in one lung and reduced breath sounds in the other. Good chance of a puncture from one or more of the broken ribs. Abdomen was hard and distended, and very painful to the touch. Bruises, abrasions and cuts covered Dean’s arms and shoulders and he had a probable fracture near his left elbow.  
He checked that a nurse was writing all of this down on the chart, and then Dean made a choked sort of sound, and Cas stepped back, shaking his head. “Someone page Doctor Harding. I can’t take this patient.”  
“Why not, Doctor Novak?” a nurse asked.  
“I don’t feel I have the experience,” Cas lied, gesturing to her to follow behind his back. Once he was outside the room, the nurse was facing him, and the door was closed, he relaxed a little.  
“I know you’re lying,” the nurse informed him.  
“I know you know,” Cas said. “I have… an emotional investment in this patient. I can’t treat him objectively.”

Cas couldn’t handle Sam giving him puppy eyes across the table. He’d taken the boy into the staff cafeteria for lunch but now found himself strongly regretting that decision.  
“Why won’t you treat my brother?” Sam asked for the tenth time. “You were my favorite. You’re more… I guess more human than the other doctors here. Everyone else forgets to treat people like they’re people.”  
Cas just shook his head and picked at his hamburger. “I won’t lie to you, Sam. Dean is a mess. Doctor Harding has taught me everything I know about real life medicine. She’ll set him right.”  
“Can’t you at least look after him through his recovery, though?” Again with the puppy eyes. Cas decided not to bother looking at Sam anymore.  
“I can’t treat a patient whose eyes haunt my dreams,” he mumbled.  
“What?”  
“I mean- uhhh-”  
“Cas… Dean is straight.”  
Cas nodded. “I know. That doesn’t mean I can’t wish he wasn’t.”  
“Do you know why he didn’t call?” Sam said suddenly, his tone so different that Cas couldn’t help but look up.  
“No?”  
“He couldn’t read your damn handwriting.” Sam snorted, trying to hold in laughter. “He seriously spent like half an hour staring at your number trying to work out if those were fours or nines.”  
“It’s not my business,” Cas started cautiously, hiding his relief, “but do you know who-”  
“Who hurt him? Yeah.” Bitterness came over Sam’s face. “Dad blamed him for my accident. Came home drunk to me with stitches on my face and a prescription for heavy-duty painkillers, his car in bits, and Dean explaining how it wasn’t my fault. And if it wasn’t my fault it had to be Dean’s.”  
Cas cringed. Violent drunks were the worst to deal with. “You’re lucky to have each other.”  
Sam nodded. “Yeah. Dean’s all I’ve got. I didn’t want to let Dad hurt him like that but I was scared.”  
“I’m glad you didn’t step in,” Cas said. “I don’t want to have to put you back together again so soon.”  
“You going to eat that?” Sam was looking at Cas’s hamburger.  
“Probably not,” Cas admitted. “You can have it if you want.”  
Cas’s pager beeped. He pulled it off his belt and checked it. “Dean’s out of surgery.”  
Sam lunged for it. Cas snatched it away out of habit, only for the boy to look at him with those puppy eyes again. “Please?”  
Cas relented and handed it over. “It doesn’t say much. Harding prefers to talk to families herself. You should meet them in Dean’s room.” He held out his hand for his pager and stood up with a sigh. “I have to get back to work now.”

The day dragged on. Cas nibbled on a granola bar at around three in the afternoon, but most of it ended up in the trash. Food didn’t hold much attraction, and he couldn’t decide if he was cold or if he needed to take off his undershirt when he got a minute. He avoided room 402 and Betty Harper commented twice that he looked tired and really should get some rest. By the time his shift ended he couldn’t decide if he felt sick or if he just needed to eat something.  
It wasn’t until about halfway through his trudge home that he realized his Monday was only getting worse. His legs were shaky, he felt freezing cold despite his phone telling him it was a very pleasant seventy-three degrees, and his head felt fuzzy.  
One block from his house, he tripped, fell, and scraped his knees and palms. But he had to get home, so he forced himself back to his feet and stumbled the last couple of hundred yards. He didn’t make it past the couch before his knees gave out.  
“Damn it,” he muttered, curling up on his side and wishing death would come quickly. “Betty was right.”


	3. Pepto-Bismol and Morphine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Poor Cas. I've had what he has, it's not fun.
> 
> I'm having a little too much fun writing this, someone settle me down before I skip the happy part entirely.

Someone was in Cas’s house. Someone who didn’t belong. He was very tall with shoulder-length hair and a wound on his cheek which Cas couldn’t recall stitching but he would know his own work anywhere.

Cas thought he might have gotten up and gotten the intruder out of his house if he had the inclination or ability to move, but every breath took conscious effort. He could smell something almost like fresh bread.

Toast. It was toast. Cas knew he should be hungry but his stomach turned at the thought of food. He shifted uncomfortably, wondering if his body would ever stop aching.

“Oh, you’re awake,” the boy said. “Dean wanted me to call you last night so I got your number off Doctor Harding. When you didn’t pick up he wanted me to come check on you so I did.”

Cas moaned pathetically. Dean. So that had to be Sam.

“And now, I’m looking after you, because I’m no doctor, but I know a fever when I see one.”

“Leave me alone to die,” Cas managed.

“Nope, sorry, I took the liberty of using your first aid kit to take your temperature and I don’t like how high it is. So you’re either putting up with me, or I’m hauling your ass to hospital.”

Hospital… Work. Cas struggled to sit up. He was supposed to be at work. “There’s no need for either.”

“Oh, no you don’t.” Sam pushed him back down and brought him something that smelled like beef soup but was just watery nothing. Cas looked at it, but didn’t move to try to… eat it? Drink it? He wasn’t actually sure how he was supposed to describe the action of consuming broth.

Toast hung out of Sam’s mouth, which explained the smell like fresh bread. It was spread with a thick layer of Nutella.

Cas frowned. That was _his_ Nutella.

Sam brought a spoon to Cas’s lips. “Eat.”

“No.”

“Eat!”

“I don’t want to.”

“You’ll feel better.”

Cas doubted that, but gave in. He didn’t have the energy to argue. “I have to call the hospital and tell them-”

“Done.”

“Tell me you didn’t call Mom.” Mom was great but Cas didn’t want her dropping everything and driving six hours just to look after him. And she would.

“Nope. I did answer your phone when Michael called, though.”

Cas groaned, allowed Sam to force-feed him one more spoonful, and then hid his face in the back of the couch. Michael would tell Mom.

Something else clicked in his head then. Dean was in hospital. Dean. Was. In. Hospital. “Is Dean okay?” he mumbled into the over-stuffed couch.

“You’re lucky I’m used to deciphering Dad,” Sam commented. “Dean’s sore, but d’you really think I’d be here if he wasn’t okay? I don’t give a stuff what he wants, he comes first. He’s my brother. You’re… no offense, but you’re not even a friend. You’re an acquaintance I guess.”

“Why are you here again?” Cas couldn’t remember.

“Dean’s worried,” Sam reminded him.

“Dean… worried… why?”

“Guess you made an impression.”

Cas turned his face back towards the boy in time to see him shrug. It didn’t make much sense to Cas either. His stomach did a particularly violent backflip and he flopped onto his back with another pathetic moan, closing his eyes in the hopes that his head would stop spinning. This wasn’t a chill. Maybe he’d caught something. He was certainly vomited on often enough to warrant that.

Speaking of vomiting… Cas clamped a hand over his mouth and bolted for the downstairs bathroom, regretting his decision to let Sam force-feed him.

 

Dean couldn’t stop fidgeting. It hurt, but somehow laying completely still was worse. Knowing there was something wrong with Cas… a man he barely knew! He shouldn’t have cared, not this much, not enough to make Sammy stay and nurse a sick man.

A nurse bustled in, adjusted his morphine pump, and took his vitals. The pain gradually faded, but the worry didn’t. It didn’t make any sense at all but Dean wanted Castiel Novak to be okay more than he wanted the morphine to work faster. And even once his own pain had faded to a dull throb, he couldn’t help but lay awake waiting for Sammy to call with an update. The minutes ticked slowly by. Every two hours, Sam had promised. The next call wasn’t for another hour and a half, so by all rights Dean knew he could easily get away with a bit of sleep, but what if… what if?

“You should sleep, sweetie,” the nurse told him.

“Waiting for a call,” he grunted.

“Your brother will call in an hour and a half, Dean. And if you don’t sleep you can’t heal. It’s sweet of you to care so much about Doctor Novak but you need to trust Sam to take care of him and focus on yourself.”

Dean scowled. Talking too much was extremely painful - his jaw was wired together in two places - but the nurse just sort of stood there waiting for his answer. Eventually he sighed. “I’ll sleep later.”

“Okay, sweetie, but don’t you try to stay awake if you get sleepy.”

Dean started to laugh at that, but pain seared up both sides of his chest and he broke off with an ‘owww’. Broken ribs were no fucking fun.

The nurse smiled at him and adjusted his morphine again until he no longer cared about the lingering ache and couldn’t remember what he was worried about. Dean’s eyes slid shut and he drifted.

 

Cas washed his mouth out in the sink and then slouched his way back to the couch. His knees gave out just as he reached it and he fell into the deep cushions, curling up on his side again and reaching out towards the remote. Sam picked it up and handed it to him, then sat down on the floor, long limbs folded up so that he looked like a baby moose.

Channel-surfing until he found something that sounded interesting, Cas let his eyes close. Keeping them open was too hard.

He was vaguely aware of Sam laughing and commenting that _Dr. Sexy_ was one of Dean’s guilty pleasures, but he didn’t respond. He just wanted to sleep. The TV provided pleasant background noise.

 

 


	4. Ellen Novak is "Overbearing Mom"

Cas woke to the sound of a car pulling into his driveway. Visitors. No. He didn’t want visitors. Maybe if he pretended to still be asleep Sam wouldn’t let them in.

“Hello, Mrs. Novak,” Sam’s voice drifted from the hall.

Oh, God. Mom.

“Please, call me Ellen.”

Cas could hear the fake smile.

“Hi, Ellen,” Sam said. “I’m Sam. Cas is asleep on the couch.”

“Michael told me you’ve taken time away from visiting your brother in hospital to look after my boy,” Mom said. Cas nearly gagged on the sugar in her voice.

“Dean practically shoved me out the door,” Sam said with a nervous chuckle.

Cas rolled over and hid his face in the cushions. He had been feeling a little better until he realized it was Mom and Sam had let her in. He tuned out the rest of the brief, painfully sugary conversation, and then tried not to jump when Mom’s cool hand landed on his shoulder.

“Cassy, you should have called me,” Mom admonished.

He rolled over to glare at her. “I knew you’d drop everything. I’m not five anymore. I’m a big boy. I can look after myself.”

Mom glanced at the cold bowl of beef broth. “Sweetie, your friend obviously disagrees. Who am I to argue?”

“He’s not my friend,” Cas protested. “He’s a patient I treated a few days ago. I don’t even know why he’s still here.”

But he was; the clanging of pots and pans in the kitchen attested to that.

“You just stay here and let us take care of you, okay? And eat something.”

“No.” He couldn’t keep the stubborn pout off his face.

“Angel-wings-” there was a snort from the kitchen “-you need food.”

“Like I need a hole in the head,” Cas muttered grumpily. “If I eat, I’ll puke, and if I puke again, I’ll die.”

“Drama queen,” Sam teased from the kitchen.

“Shut up,” Cas groaned back. The smell of food was starting to waft through. The rich scent of barbecue steak on the grill, no less. Normally his favorite, but now enough to make him curl up and whimper.

The baby moose’s head poked into the lounge. “You look pathetic. Don’t worry. The steak’s for me. Ellen, do you want any?”

“It smells wonderful,” Mom said with a smile.

“Don’t eat it anywhere near me,” Cas warned them both.

 

Dean stirred just before dinner was brought into his room. He stared at it groggily, brain failing to process that he was meant to eat it. It wasn’t dinner time, Sammy was supposed to call four times before dinner to give him updates on Cas.

His cell buzzed. He reached for it a little too fast and pain lanced up his side and arm, but he ignored that and focused on the fact that Sammy was calling.

“Hey,” he slurred. “How’s Cas?”

“If I get sick because I’m looking after him for you, I swear I’ll puke on you,” Sam said cheerfully.

Dean wasn’t sure why he found this statement so hilarious, but he barked out a sluggish laugh, not even caring that it brought more pain to his body. “Better you than me. Can you imagine puking with your ribs smashed to toothpicks?”

“Only one of your ribs is broken in more than one place, Dean.”

“Oh yeah.” He laughed again. “I feel so weird. Morphine is wonderful.”

“Yeah… You need to eat dinner when they bring it in, by the way.”

“But it’s not dinnertime,” Dean said, confused. “You’ve only called once.”

“No, Dean, I’ve called four times. You were obviously asleep or something.”

“Wow,” Dean ‘thought’. “How many hours is that? Eight? More?”

He blinked stupidly when Sammy answered his ‘thoughts’ with a chuckled, “Eight. Four times two is eight. How high are you?”

“No, Sammy, it’s ‘hi, how are you?’” Dean mumbled, looking at his food with a little less confusion than before.

“I’ll let you eat,” Sam chuckled. “Cas is feeling better, I think. He keeps looking at my pizza like you look at pie.”

“Pie,” Dean echoed, picking up his fork and pushing half his food off the tray before he remembered how to use cutlery properly. “I could really go for some pie.”

“I’ll get you some tomorrow,” Sam promised. There was a dull buzz and then Dean listened to silence for a while before his brain caught up to the fact that there was nobody on the other end of the phone anymore and he put it aside with a vague smile.

 

Mom returned to Cas’s side with a bowl full of broth. Cas eyed it with no small measure of suspicion. Last time he let someone spoonfeed him broth, he puked it up only a few minutes later. He wanted pizza, not stupid broth. But finally, when Mom threatened to lever his mouth open with a crowbar and tip it down his throat, he relented and picked up the spoon. His whole body trembled and he was sweating, but he didn’t feel like he was going to puke anymore.

He ate half the bowl before setting his spoon aside and laying back again. He was still hungry but eating more felt like a bad idea, like his poor raw stomach didn’t want to expand far enough to take it in, so he decided not to push his luck.

Sam was really relishing that pizza, he thought as sleep rose up to claim him again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That high-on-morphine phone call though.


	5. Dean Winchester Is "Not" Attracted To Castiel Novak

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HALP
> 
> I AM HAVING FAR TOO MUCH FUN TORTURING MY BOYS
> 
> HALP MEH

Cas was back at work in two more days and Sam helped him send Mom safely on her way. Mom insisted on planting a kiss on Sam’s cheek as well as Cas’s and both of them grimaced and shared an exasperated glance before parting ways.

It wasn’t until two weeks after that that Cas worked up the courage to pick up the damn phone when Dean called. And Dean called daily.

“Doctor Novak,” he answered automatically.

“Jeeze, Cas,” Dean complained. “Anybody would think you’d been avoiding me.”

Cas blushed. He sort of had. “Sorry about that. I’ve been… I’ve been really busy.” His blush deepened when he realized his voice had dropped nearly a whole octave upon hearing Dean’s voice. That was his bedroom voice. God.

“Well, they’re letting me out in a few hours, so how about that beer?”

Cas beamed. It was stupid to be so happy that Dean wanted to go get a beer with him. “Sure, when?”

“Uhh, I was hoping maybe tonight?”

Shit. Cas was on call. He sat up and puffed out a disappointed sigh. “I wish I could, but if the hospital needs me and I’ve been drinking…”

“Oh, you’re on call,” Dean realized. “Okay. What about tomorrow?”

It was so nice to not have to explain how a hospital worked. Cas vaguely recalled Sam mentioning that Dr. Sexy was Dean’s favorite TV show. It wasn’t accurate by any stretch of the imagination but it certainly didn’t avoid the subject of doctors being ‘on call’... even if it did exaggerate the number of them who liked to fuck nurses in the on-call rooms. “Tomorrow sounds good, if you’re willing to put up with me yawning my head off. Friday nights are crazy in Trauma. I’m not even going to try to pretend I’m going to get any sleep tonight.” He had not intended for that last sentence to sound as dirty as it did. He was pretty sure his cheeks were either about to burst into flames or nearing the color of a ripe tomato.

Dean seemed oblivious. Thank God. “Long as you don’t fall asleep on me I’m good.”

“Great. Um. I’ll call you?”

“Yeah, okay.”

“See ya tomorrow night.”

“Yeah, see ya.”

Cas put his phone down and hid his face in his hands. Dean was straight. Dean was fucking straight. Bedroom voice was not appropriate. If he could take back that whole damn phone call, that would be pretty fucking nice.

He flopped back down and squeezed his eyes shut, but Dean’s voice kept playing over and over in Cas’s head, and Cas realized suddenly - be still my beating heart, he thought - that the beautiful young man’s voice had deepened in response to Cas’s bedroom voice.

Fuck.

Did that mean…?

No. Surely not.

“Kill me,” he groaned to no one in particular. He was acting like a fourteen-year-old girl and damn it if he wasn’t enjoying every second!

There was, however, one thing very not fourteen-year-old-girlish about his feelings. The way his body responded to the mere memory of Dean’s voice going deep and husky like that.

He needed a cold shower, he decided. Followed by an ice water bath, followed by a run naked in the snow. The latter wasn’t going to happen, and he didn’t think there was enough ice in the world to make an ice water bath cold enough.

As it turned out, though the water that came out of his showerhead was cold enough to make every single hair on his body stand on end, it wasn’t working. He had a raging hard-on at the memory of a fucking phone call.

He needed help, he decided, biting his lip. He couldn’t even bring himself to want to try to think of women - his biggest turn-off - but Dean was fucking straight and if the best he could get was friendship with the guy, then that was what he would have to live with.

So, though he didn’t want to force his boner to soften, he remembered high school. Girls trying to make him lose his virginity. Girls practically raping him. A shudder ran down his spine. That experience had been… more than a little traumatic. Mom didn’t know. Nobody knew. Michael had asked him why he flinched every time a girl looked at him, and Gabe had wisely told their big brother to shut the hell up.

It was, in the end, Anna - his sister, the eldest of the four Novak siblings - who had helped him relax around girls again. He had plenty of female friends, but until Anna had hypnotized him and convinced his subconscious that nobody was going to try to hurt him, he hadn’t been able to fucking have fun hanging out with them.

He shook his head, shivering all over now from the cold, and cut the water, towelling off quickly. His pager beeped from his bedside table.

“It’s show time,” he muttered, pulling on his scrubs.

 

Dean was not attracted to Castiel Novak. Or so he told himself. He had no explanation for why, all of a sudden, he had started talking in his bedroom voice to the guy, but he was NOT FUCKING ATTRACTED TO CASTIEL NOVAK. No way. Straight guys did not find other guys’ voices that goddamned erotic.

Piercing blue eyes flitted across his memory and he whimpered, drawing a concerned glance from the nurse who was in the process of pulling out his stitches.

“You’re doing great,” she said encouragingly.

Good, Dean thought. She’d misinterpreted that whimper. Couldn’t have nurses walking around wondering why the fuck he was reduced to a pathetic whimpering mess over a guy’s fucking _voice_. And eyes. Oh, God, those eyes.

“I’m gonna have my first beer since Sammy’s accident when I get outta here,” he growled. “And it’s gonna be amazing.”

“I’m sure it will,” the nurse said. She wasn’t listening to him. He didn’t care. He needed to think about beer and cars and why football was for idiots and baseball was the only halfway interesting sport that didn’t involve engines.

He did not need to think about deep, gravelly voices and blue eyes that stared right through him all the way into his soul.

Once the nurse was gone, he slumped carefully back into his pillows - he’d have to be careful for another six goddamned weeks - and groaned. “I need to get laid.”

BY A GIRL, he told his mind when it oh-so-helpfully offered him another vision of damn Castiel Novak’s fucking eyes.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No seriously I really, really am.


	6. Castiel Novak's Worst Night On Call

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys. Help.
> 
> WHY IS IT SO MUCH FUN TO TORTURE CAS D:

It was 3am and things were finally starting to settle down when it happened.

Cas was just starting on his fourth energy drink when every single pager in the staff cafeteria went nuts. He groaned, watched everyone else scramble, and then forced his heavy limbs to move. The only thing that could warrant this number of doctors being paged was a major accident, and Cas wasn't sure he was really awake enough, but if he was needed then he was needed and so be it.

Somehow he managed to make his legs carry him at a run and he quickly caught up with the stragglers from the cafeteria mass exodus, pulling his pager from his belt.

_All doctors to ED STAT._

That was all it said. No details. Adrenaline coursed through his body and he kicked up the pace a little. He ended up being one of the first from the cafeteria to get there.

Pandemonium greeted him. There were people everywhere. The overwhelming influx of ambulances didn't look like letting up anytime soon.

Cas soon found himself dashing between patients, not wasting a single second. Everybody's calmness and professionalism suffered in times like this. Student doctors were the first to be blamed when things went wrong. Voices were raised and spirits lowered. By 4am Cas had treated so many lacerations he'd lost count, splinted four broken limbs, handed seven patients to experienced trauma surgeons for urgent surgery, and was elbows-deep in some guy's abdomen, trying to find a bleeder.

Things went from bad to worse when the guy's bowel perforated. Cas forgot about the bleeder and turned his attention to fixing that before it flooded toxins through the patient's body.

And the _stench_. God, he'd never smelled anything so foul in his life!

"Harding, I need you to keep looking for that bleeder," he said when her hands joined his. "I got this."

"You haven't fixed a bowel perf in a living patient solo before, Novak."

"Let me do this."

"Alright. I just found the bleeder anyway."

Conversation ceased. Harding called for suction a few times; Cas never had to.

At nearly quarter to six they finally closed up. Harding stripped her gloves off and patted Cas on the shoulder.

"Well done. That was absolutely textbook."

Cas just nodded, too exhausted to speak.

"You can g-"

Machines squealed. Cas's hands flew to the patient's chest automatically and he started compressions while Harding made the patient breathe and one of the nurses ran for a defibrillator.

"Clear!" Harding shouted. Cas stepped back and put his hands in the air.

The alarms continued. Cas vagued out. He wasn't sure what he was supposed to do but his body worked of its own accord.

"Clear!"

He stepped back again. For a second time, the patient arched up off the table. Still nothing.

The pattern continued for another fifteen minutes, the medical team trying something and having no success. Harding looked up at the clock on the wall.

Cas stepped in and shoved his thumb into a pressure point just below the patient's nose. A last-ditch, desperate effort. That point was a heart-starting point.

But it still didn't work.

"Time of death, five-fifty-six A.M." Cas looked down at his feet and sighed. This wasn't the first patient he'd lost. Working in Trauma, a doctor lost more patients than nearly any other department. Regardless, it still hit hard.

Exhaustion hit him again and he just stared at Harding when she congratulated him on doing his job well. Sometimes, she told him, patients died despite everything.

Cas nodded numbly. He knew that. He was just so... so tired.

"You can go home now if you want," Harding said. "Get some sleep. I'll make sure you aren't paged again."

"I'm on call until-"

"Eight, yes, I know. But you've carried twice the load of any other Resident, and you're dead on your feet."

Cas managed a tired but grateful smile, submitting to a bloody hug only because he had as much blood on him as Harding did.

"See you Monday," she told him. He nodded and walked away in a daze, wondering if he was safe to drive home or not. Probably not.

He ended up showering and then sleeping in an on call room.

 

"Come on, come on, pick up," Dean muttered into his phone, listening to the dialtone. It was nearly 7pm and Cas still hadn't called. Sammy kept fussing over him and it was driving him nuts. He needed to get out. To have a few beers with a friend and talk cars for a while.

"Mmh?" a sleepy voice mumbled in his ear.

"Did I wake you? Sorry. I'm just going mad here, Sammy won't leave me alone."

"Dean. Sorry. Yeah. I was sort of awake already. Can you... can you come pick me up? 'M not safe to drive. Last night was crazy."

Right. Dean had forgotten that Cas worked Trauma. The apartment building collapse would have resulted in hundreds of patients for Cas to have to help deal with. "Yeah, I can do that. Be there in about half an hour?"

"'Kay. If I'm not at the main entrance waiting for you, call me again. I feel like I might drift off again."

Poor Cas. He sounded exhausted. "Alright. You wanna take a raincheck? I can get you home..."

"Nah, I need it..."

"Okay." Dean’s brow creased. Something was wrong. "You okay?"

"I'll tell you later," Cas mumbled. "If you talk and drive I'm not putting your ass back together."

Dean chuckled and hung up, starting Baby up and ignoring Sam, who sprinted out with a protest on his lips upon hearing the engine's loud rumble.

 

Cas woke again to Battle Cry playing loudly through the on call room. He groaned, rolled over, and promptly fell off the bed.

That woke him up properly. He got clumsily to his feet and fished his phone out of his backpack. Dean. "Sorry," he said. "Be right out."

"It's fine. You gonna tell me what happened?"

"Face to face over a beer is better," Cas muttered awkwardly, shouldering his backpack and letting himself out of the room.

“That bad?”

“That bad.”

“Dude.”

“Yeah. It was a long night. I just want to get out of-” Cas broke off and glared at one of his fellow Residents. “No, Charlie, I’m not doing your charts. I’ve been here nearly twenty-four hours and I want to go home.”

“You owe me for not taking that dissecting aorta when you were sick,” Charlie told him.

“No I don’t,” Cas said firmly. “That’s cardiothoracic. Not my domain.” He looked pointedly at his phone and then walked away. “Sorry about that, Dean, Charlie’s a good friend but she hates paperwork and lacks tact and timing.”

Dean just chuckled. “So how ‘bout that beer?”

“I’m coming, I swear, it’s a big hospital!” Cas protested. The main entrance was well within sight, and just on the other side of the huge glass sliding doors stood the most beautiful man in Cas’s world. “I’m going to hang up now.”

Suddenly Dean’s eyes flicked up from the ground and locked onto Cas, and the younger man beamed like he was looking at his favorite person in the world. Cas’s cheeks warmed a little. He was trying desperately not to read anything into that smile, but God, it was hard not to hope…

 

A couple of hours later, a slightly tipsy Cas finally worked up the courage to talk about what was upsetting him. Dean didn’t want to push the guy, but he obviously needed someone to hear him out.

“It was… it was just a normal Friday night,” Cas murmured, pausing often to order his thoughts. “A few stabbings, a few glassings, a few fistfights, some guy hit his girlfriend over the head with a brick… nothing unusual. Other than the shit-ton of overdoses that came in, but I’m Trauma, I deal with injuries. Not overdoses. It was steady. Got busy around midnight, stayed busy for a couple of hours. The usual pattern. Things were starting to settle down when Harding lost a patient - multiple GSW to the chest, hardly surprising, would’ve been a miracle if she’d saved him - and decided we both needed caffeine. She got coffee, then sent me to go get what I wanted. I’d only just cracked my Red Bull when every pager in the cafeteria - no, the whole damned hospital - went crazy. That was, what, three A.M? Probably ten, fifteen minutes after Hillsgate Plaza collapsed. It was… it was nuts. I don’t even know how many lacerations I stitched. I was in charge of a lot of the quick and basic stuff, the stitching and the cleaning and dressing of wounds and the splinting of broken limbs.”

Dean nodded, trying not to glance at his own broken arm.

“And then this one guy came in. Presented fairly simply, so he was handed to me, because I’m fast and I get the easy ones out of the way so the waiting room isn’t flooded. Only… he wasn’t simple. I stitched the cuts on his face and arms, and he went into shock quite badly so I decided to keep him in for observation. I was halfway through treating a four-year-old with abrasions and contusions affecting over ninety percent of her body and a complex compound fracture of the right tibia when my pager went 911 and when your pager goes 911 you drop everything. The guy I kept for observation was complaining of severe abdominal pain. Upon examination, like you, his abdomen was hard, distended, and extremely painful. Unlike you, his pain tolerance wasn’t that high. There was no time for scans; with as fast as it had come on, it could only be internal bleeding from multiple sources. Harding and I kicked a less urgent surgery out of OR two and opened him up. Most of it was easy to locate and fix. We only had one bleeder left to find when his bowel perforated. He was falling apart on the damn table. I fixed that up, took a while, nearly two hours. He was perfect inside when we closed him up. And then he fucking coded before anybody could think about taking him into recovery.”

Dean wanted to reach out and wipe the tears off Cas’s cheek. Instead, he gulped down some more of his Heineken. “Shit, man.”

“We… we tried everything. But nothing worked. Nothing. I can’t stop wondering if I fucked up somehow. Missed something, or screwed up the bowel perf repair... I guess we won’t know for sure until the autopsy’s done. Families always want an autopsy when a loved one dies on the operating table. I think I’ve had one whose family accepted on the face of it that she’d died of her injuries. I don’t… I don’t like losing them, Dean… but when it’s the last patient of the day… you didn’t get enough caffeine to really be able to function… and… and… you can’t remember if you did it right…” Cas trailed off, shaking his head.

Dean decided there was absolutely nothing gay about giving a guy a hug when he needed one. His skin did not tingle where Cas’s body made contact with his. Nuh-uh. No way. “Hell of a day.”

Cas nodded and mumbled, “You can say that again,” into Dean’s shoulder. He fell asleep slumped over the bar only ten minutes later. Dean looked at him, then down at himself, then sighed. How the hell was he supposed to get the guy to the Impala with one arm in a sling and most of his ribs held together with bits of metal?

“Someone help me get him home,” he yelled to the bar at large. A guy he’d talked cars with once or twice at classic car shows stood up and strode through the usual crowd to look down at the sleeping doctor.

“Tell me ya borrowed someone else’s car,” the guy said. “That Impala you call Baby, she’s a beauty, but gettin’ drunk guys into road-huggers like her is a bitch.”

Dean  grimaced. “I’d feel unfaithful if I drove anything else. But Cas isn’t drunk. He just had a really bad day.” He wasn’t sure why he felt the need to defend the dark-haired doctor, but decided it didn’t really matter anyway.

“Eh, we’ll get him in.”

Dean was just glad the guy was a three-fifty-pound quarterback. Seemed football was good for something, after all.

“Gonna need your brother to get him out again,” the footballer said, hefting Cas over his shoulder.

Dean could only nod in mute agreement.


	7. Dean Winchester Is STRAIGHT!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay guys this one's a bit shorter, I wanted to get it posted tonight rather than making you guys wait until tomorrow and I have to be up early so I can't stay up late.
> 
> Enjoy :3

“Psst. Sammy.” Dean pressed his face up against Sam’s bedroom window, and then, finally giving up on getting his brother’s attention the nice way, lit his face from below with a flashlight before rapping on the glass twice.

Sam didn’t fall for it this time. Disappointing. Maybe ghosts had started to lose their creepiness now that little Sammy was growing up. It was about time. Eighteen was no age to still be afraid of ghosts.

“What?” Sam snapped. “I have homework!”

“A little help? Cas fell asleep.” Dean gave half a shrug - half because it was sort of difficult to manage a whole one with one arm in a sling - and turned away, hoping Sam would help.

“Wait!”

He turned back, looking at his little brother with one eyebrow raised.

“Dad’s home, you sure it’s wise?”

Dean shrugged. “You’re supposed to get in the damn car so I can get Cas home, idiot.”

“Don’t call me an idiot!”

“Don’t be such a bitch, then.”

“Jerk,” Sam huffed and shut the blinds.

Dean was about to give up and just let Cas sleep in the car when his stupidly tall little brother burst out of the house barefoot and in jeans and an old plaid shirt worn open at the front. Without a word, Sam opened the passenger door, hauled a sleeping Castiel out of the car, and shut it again.

 

Cas woke in an unfamiliar room around midnight. The blanket over him and the pillows beneath his head smelled good. Damn good. Dean-ish. He sat up and rubbed his eyes, listening to the quiet banter downstairs. He couldn’t make out words but it sounded like they were discussing him. He slid out of bed and padded silently downstairs, keeping just out of sight.

“...see the way you look at him,” Sam was saying. “I don’t know, I guess I just don’t see the point in freaking out about it.”

“You know what Dad would do.”

“Why does Dad have to come into it? Who gives a fuck what Dad thinks?”

“I’m straight, Sammy. And it needs to stay that way.”

“Dean, for God’s sake, Dad hates _Jess_. He’s going to hate anyone. You’re _twenty-fucking-two_. He has no right to dictate your life.”

“Sam-”

“I mean it, if you don’t pull your head out of your ass you’re going to miss out. And you’re a cranky motherfucker as it is.”

“I am not!”

“You kinda are.”

“Am not!”

Cas smiled to himself and ghosted back to Dean’s bedroom. If he was patient… then maybe… just maybe…

 

Damn Sammy didn’t know how to leave well enough alone, Dean thought while he waited for the shower to get to an acceptable temperature. He was _straight_.

He was a straight guy and Sam had forced him to admit he might be more than a little attracted to another guy. And then given him a lecture about why there was no reason to freak out. No reason at all. Not even the threat of Dad finally snapping. Dean knew exactly what Dad would say. John Winchester did not raise either of his boys to be a ‘fucking fairy fag’. It was almost poetic. If not for the hateful way those words would be delivered, Dean thought, it might almost be a line from a sonnet or something.

Whatever. English was never his best subject in school. There was a reason he had chosen not to go to college.

And Cas had told him he spoke well.

Why the _hell_ was the memory of those big, soulful, tear-filled blue eyes giving him a soft boner? Dean growled a curse under his breath and ignored it. He needed to do something about this fucked up sex drive of his, but he would do it after his shower. At least he didn’t have to go into his room to get to his porn stash.

He tried to think of tits and ass but didn’t have any luck. All he could see was Cas, and all he could hear was Cas’s voice, and it was sexy as hell. Trying to fight it without having anything to fight it with only made it worse. He swore again and cut the water after only a very short shower, fleeing up to the loft.

Where his porn mags were.

Where he would be sleeping tonight, because Cas was in his bed.

 _Cas was in his fucking bed_. And the more he thought about that, the harder he got. He locked the door, selected a Playboy and flicked through it, eventually deciding on a busty blonde. Forcing himself to focus on those perfect tits, he wrapped his fingers around his cock and worked it, adding a little twist on the upstroke. A little pearl of pre-cum beaded on the tip.

And Dean lost focus. As he jerked himself off faster and faster, the blonde girl slipped from his awareness, to be replaced by a dark-haired… blue-eyed… beautiful… doctor.

“Cas,” he panted, eyes slipping shut. “Oh, God. Please, Cas, please, God, Cas…”

Cas’s eyes looking up at him through those long, dark lashes… Cas’s plump pink lips wrapped around his cock… “Cas… Cas, please, please!”

He didn’t care that his ragged breathing hurt his ribs. He was so hard… so hard it hurt… more pre-cum leaked onto his hand with each upstroke. His hips thrust into his hand.

Cas. Cas’s strong, steady hands on his hips, encouraging him to thrust deep. Cas, swallowing him deep, gazing up at him and not giving a _damn_ that he wasn’t completely certain he was straight anymore. Cas… Cas… “Fuck, please, Cas, please!”

He lost rhythm, imagining Cas moaning and gasping, Cas hot for him. Cas screaming his name.

Dean came with a yell, squirting sticky white ropes all over his own chest and stomach, nearly all the way up to his chin. “Cas! _CAS_!”

Then he freaked out.

He had just enjoyed the most intense orgasm he had ever had… while jerking off over a _guy_. While screaming Cas’s fucking _name_! He wasn’t gay. He wasn’t _gay_! His sex drive was just fucked up to the max because he hadn’t screwed anybody in a while. He needed to get laid. That was all. He just needed to get laid. Then he would go back to only being attracted to girls.

Yeah… yeah… he was fine. He was a straight guy. His body was just screaming out for sex and didn’t care where he got it. That was it. That was all.

He cleaned himself up with an old t-shirt and then curled up in the old single bed that still smelled faintly of cat piss and submitted to post-orgasm drowsiness.

Sleep was not restful. His dreams were haunted by electric blue eyes, perpetual black sex-hair, and Batman’s fucking bedroom voice.

And then there was the wet dream. He would never admit it to anyone, but it was the best wet dream he had ever had.

And it was Cas.


	8. Castiel Novak Is Religious

The first of the chocolate chip pancakes was in the frying pan and Cas was humming his favorite _30 Seconds to Mars_ song when John Winchester walked into the kitchen. It took the man a few seconds to process that there was a stranger in his house. Cas watched him with one eyebrow raised, and didn’t react when John slammed him into a wall.

“Who are you?” Dean’s dad demanded.

“Hi,” Cas said with a smile. “I’m Doctor Castiel Novak. A friend of Dean’s. I really appreciate him letting me crash here last night. Thought I’d make pancakes as a thank you.”

“Well, _Castiel_ ,” John growled, “this isn’t Dean’s house. It’s mine. So don’t you go thinking you can stay here whenever you feel like it. Understood?”

“Yes, sir.”

John seemed to like that. At least, it raised half a smile, and the man stepped back and tilted his head at the stove. “How ‘bout those pancakes?”

Scary guy, Cas thought, casually flipping the pancake up into the air and catching it with the pan.

“You make a mess, you’re cleaning it up.”

“Yes, sir.”

That was about the extent of the conversation. Occasionally John would ask a question and Cas would provide a two-word answer - stuff like, “Are you the one who put Sam back together after his accident?” with a response of, “Yes, sir.”

Cas poured maple syrup over a stack of six big pancakes and set the plate in front of John. “I only have enough batter for twenty-four all up,” he said a little tentatively. “It’s Mom’s recipe…”

John grunted and waved him away, so he went back to the stove. Hopefully Dean would be up soon…

“Hey, Sammy, don’t you dare walk out of that door without trying these pancakes first,” John said.

Cas paused, glancing over his shoulder. “They’re for everyone,” he said. “My share, because I’m hungry, and the other three shares as thanks for not leaving my passed-out ass at the bar.”

“You didn’t even drink enough to get a hangover and you passed out? Fucking lightweight,” John commented.

“Not from the alcohol,” Cas clarified. “I was on call when Hillsgate Plaza collapsed. After a night like that I have a tendency to randomly fall asleep for about a day and a half afterwards.”

“They smell great, Cas, but I’m running late,” said Sam. “My English final is tomorrow. Jess is helping me study.”

“More for me.” Cas grinned and dumped another two pancakes on John’s plate.

John made an appreciative sound and wolfed them down before leaning back and patting his stomach. “Those were some pancakes. Is your mom a chef?”

Cas laughed and shook his head. “No, she’s an artist. She always says mixing a good pancake batter is just like mixing paints, you don’t want to under-work it or over-work it.”

“How d’you flip them without killing them?” Dean asked sleepily from halfway up the stairs.

“Practice. One of my uncles is a chef and I worked in his kitchen part time all the way through high school.” Cas grinned and tipped one more pancake on top of Dean’s stack. An ooze of maple syrup later, and the plate was on the table. “You better hurry up and eat them before your dad mugs you for them.”

“Mmh, thanks, Cas.”

 

Pancakes. Was there anything Cas couldn’t do? Fucking _pancakes_. Like they were the easiest thing in the world. Perfectly round pancakes. When Dean tried, he always ended up with the weirdest shaped half-cooked absolute inedible messes. And here was Cas, churning out perfect pancake after perfect fucking pancake.

“God damn, Cas,” he mumbled through a mouthful of chocolate chip heaven. “You should sell these.”

“Uncle Raph _does_ ,” Cas said, grinning, as he flipped yet another perfect pancake onto a plate.

Stupid overachievers and their stupid good-at-everything-ness. “Um. Why all the effort?” Cas didn’t need to make perfect chocolate chip pancakes to impress Dean. He was already impressed.

“An apology for being shitty company and falling asleep on you, and a thanks for not leaving me at the bar.”

Jesus fucking Christ. Could that smile get any more dazzling? Cas wasn’t human. No way. The guy was a fucking angel, surely. It was the only explanation for him being so damn good at everything and so handsome with such a phenomenal voice… and apparently able to turn straight guys gay. There had to be something. One vital flaw to balance out all the fucking perfection. Dean wasn’t sure he could handle the idea of someone being that goddamned perfect when he was so fucked up.

 

Cas tried not to watch too closely as Dean ate but the noises the guy made... little involuntary moans and sighs...

Looking away to hide the blush that rose in his cheeks, Cas tried desperately not to remember hearing Dean yell his name last night. Not to imagine drawing those little moans out of Dean’s throat with light fingers in just the right places. He didn't have a lot of luck. It was getting harder and harder to sit at the table and not reach across it to take Dean’s chin in his hands and kiss the guy senseless. The only thing keeping Cas from doing just that was John Winchester’s continued presence.

He finished his fifth pancake just as Dean leaned back, away from an empty plate. Cas stood and slid his last three pancakes onto Dean’s plate with a shy smile before collecting the pan, the empty batter bowl, John's plate, and the remaining dirty dishes, and taking them to the sink to wash up.

Dean’s eyes on his back made the hairs on the back of his neck prickle. Cas suppressed a pleased shiver.

 _Give him time. Just give him time._ Waiting was hard but the thought of pushing him away by asking too much of him was terrifying. Cas hadn't had much luck with these feelings in the past. It seemed falling for straight guys was a pattern, and he hadn't been lucky enough to fall for a straight guy who was willing to make an exception. Except for one, and he'd made his move too soon and scared the guy off. He was determined not to make the same mistake again. Dean was too... too important. Already.

"Hey, you don't have to wash up," Dean said. That was... that was almost bedroom voice.

Cas dropped the plate he was washing, blushed furiously, and had to clear his throat before he could speak. "I... you wouldn't have used all this. I didn't want to be any trouble." It was a good thing he had his back to Dean, because he didn't want anybody seeing that his face had gone beet red. Not that it made much difference, since when he blushed the tops of his ears and the back of his neck went pink, but somehow it was less embarrassing.

 

Was Cas... blushing? And why, Dean wondered, did he find that idea so damned adorable?

Maybe Sam was right.

But if Sam was right... fuck, what would Dad say? It wouldn't be a pleasant conversation, that was for sure. Dean wasn't even sure he would be welcome in this house... and if he didn't live here, who would draw Dad's rage away from Sammy? Dean had taken beatings for his little brother for years. It was always something. Sammy was too nerdy. Dad didn't like Sammy’s girlfriend. Sam needed to cut his hair - long hair was for fags. Sam had left the toilet seat down after taking a shit. Little things. Stupid things. When Dad was drunk, Sammy copped it. Dean was usually able to act as a distraction, often getting his own ass kicked in the process. He needed to be careful. If Dad kicked him out, no one would be there to keep Sam safe.

Cas finished the washing up and turned to face the table with a shy smile. Dean looked down at the last pancake. Heat rose in his face.

"I should go pick up my car," Cas said. "If I miss church again the pastor will have my head."

Religious. Fucking figured. Dean fought to keep the grimace off his face. Of course there was something. There was nothing more irritating than a fucking Christian. Perfect Cas wasn't perfect after all.

But maybe Dean could forgive him his religion. After all, the guy hadn't mentioned it once until just now.

"Yeah, alright," he grunted, stuffing half the last pancake into his mouth. "You should come to the Chevy show next weekend. Baby's entered in the factory condition Impala division - gonna get Bobby Singer to detail her for it."

"Sounds awesome," Cas said with a big smile in his voice. Dean had to look up. Had to see it. Knew he would regret it but also knew it would be the most beautiful thing...

And it was. Cas didn't just smile with his mouth. Every part of him became - fuck - more beautiful. That huge smile faltered and faded into a shy one, and then Cas turned and fled with a little wave. Dean sighed and turned his eyes to Dad. As expected, Dad wore an impressive glower.

"What is _wrong_ with you?" Dean demanded.

"Your friend is queer," Dad snarled.

Dean flinched at the hate dripping off every word. "And?"

"Fags aren't welcome in this house. Understood?"

"What the fuck, Dad? You just five goddamn minutes ago raved about his pancakes!" Dean stood up, stuffed the last of the pancake into his mouth, and took his plate to the sink. "I'm going out."

Dad was sober but it didn't stop his fist colliding hard with Dean’s stomach. Dean took the blow, rock-hard abs clenched, and just walked out the door. He had no time for Dad's shit and Sam wasn't home so didn't need defending.

"Cas!" he shouted. "Get your ass back here and get in the car! You're not walking all the way to the hospital."

Cas stopped and turned, and Dean could see the tears on his face from here. "Are you sure?"

"To borrow a phrase from Bobby, of course I'm sure, y'idjit!" Dean waited until Cas was near before holding his arms wide. "You need a hug? Dad's a dick. I know."

Cas raised a tentative smile and accepted the hug. Dean couldn't help but smile back.

"Listen. Just because my dad doesn't think gays are real people doesn't mean I share his opinion."

Cas nodded and let him go. "I should be used to it."

"You shouldn't have to," Dean growled, sliding into Baby's driver's seat and starting her up. Cas got into the passenger's seat and rubbed at his face. Dean frowned. Something else was wrong. "What?"

"I saw your face... when I mentioned my faith," Cas mumbled.

"That was... I shouldn't have reacted like that... I just... Christians can be hateful. Sammy and I... we're the sons of a drunk." Dean kept his eyes carefully on the road, not sure what they told Cas. "We grew up being told our daddy was going to hell and we were going to end up just like him. I thought once I got to twenty-one and never got drunk enough to have a hangover it would stop and for the most part it did but Christians still tell me every goddamned day that I'm going to hell. They've just picked something else to hate me for."

"Your constant blasphemy?" Cas sighed sadly. "I'm not like that."

"I know, I just- look, I can't help it, okay?! Who the hell are they to tell me how to live my life? How do you survive them, man?" Cas's hand brushed his shoulder. Dean shivered at the touch. He wanted more, and that both excited and terrified him. And Cas was smiling again.

"You're referring to my sexuality. They don't like it but I've been a good Christian all my life. They can quote the Bible at me until they're blue in the face and I'll have a counter-quote for anything. They've given up trying to 'save' me."

Dean shook his head slowly. This guy. How in hell did he manage to be so damn... comfortable with himself? "How can they accept you and hate me? I mean... I'm a straight guy. I don't drink. I don't smoke. I've never deliberately hurt anyone in my life. I do my best to be a decent person. Just because I don't believe in God and don't like it when people try to force me to doesn't make me evil."

"I don't know, Dean."

"Ah, shit, I didn't mean-"

"I know," Cas said. "You just meant you're straight-" his voice cracked on the word "-and I'm not. And there's a part of Christianity that believes my sexuality is the worst sin there is."

"I'm not sure I am anymore," Dean mumbled.

"What?"

"Nothing."


	9. Dean Winchester The Romantic

Dean wasn't given to random acts of romance, so he had no fucking idea why he was doing this, but he found himself in the florist's store for the first time since sophomore year trying to decide whether Cas was the sort to like roses.

Dad was away and that meant free reign over the house and who got to spend time there. Sam had invited Cas over to join in on their Monday night gaming night and Cas had gracefully accepted, stating that he wasn't a gamer so he would probably suck but would try his best.

And Dean, in true Dean style, had called Sam a bitch and told him to back the fuck off and stop meddling. Now he couldn't stop stressing.

"Can I help you with anything, sir?"

Dean smiled shyly. "I, uh, I'm looking for something, uh, um, romantic for, uh-"

"A new girlfriend? Oh honey, I can help with that!" The florist was too enthusiastic. Too bouncy. Too... too everything.

"No, uh, he... he... he's not a girl."

The woman just beamed, still too happy. "Oh how excellent, this store has something for every sexuality. You can't go wrong with roses, but if you want to impress, stay away from red. What about blue? Blue roses are rare and will say what you want to say."

Dean nodded. "Show me."

 

Cas couldn't sit still. Harding kept glancing at him, so he held up a candy bar and tilted his head quizzically. She just shrugged and kept shooting him looks. Significant ones that he didn't understand.

Finally he got sick of it and turned away from his stroganoff, glaring. "What? Did I grow an extra head?"

"Sorry, I'm just a little concerned. Cas, you've been fidgety and distracted since Saturday. Did losing-?"

"That patient has nothing to do with it," Cas snapped. "I'm fine!"

Harding raised an eyebrow, obviously not convinced, but she let the matter drop without another word. Cas wasn't sure he liked it when she tried to be his friend. She was his teacher and in his experience it wasn't clever to be friends with your teacher.

Battle Cry started playing. Cas let out a very unmanly squeak and snatched his phone off the table. Dean!

"Hello," he said.

"Hey, Cas! You on lunch?"

"Yeah."

"For how long?"

"Only another five minutes," Cas said with a frustrated sigh. "You should've called sooner."

"I was... I was working." Cas could hear the blush on Dean’s face.

"On your car?" Enthusiasm was good. Might get Dean talking, loosen him up.

"No, um... shut up, Sammy! I- shut the fuck up, Sam, I mean it. I'll kick your ass." Dean chuckled nervously. "Flipping burgers. I was never the college type and Bobby's the only mechanic this side of anywhere who'll give me a go... and what he can pay won't pay the bills."

Cas couldn't help a chuckle. "That's not that much different than what I did to put myself through college. I just flipped pancakes and steaks instead."

He was rewarded for his efforts with a hearty laugh. "I swear to God, you're the best, Cas."

Unfortunately he really had to go. Harding was looking at him again, a warning in her eyes. "Dude I have to get back to work now. I'm being given 'the look'."

"Not the look!" Dean said in mock horror. "You still coming tonight?"

Cas smiled softly, though he knew Dean couldn't see him. "Of course. Later."

He hung up, then turned off his phone. Back to work.

“It’s none of my business,” Harding said, “until it starts to affect your work. And it’s affecting your work.”

Cas nodded. “Sorry. I’ll do better.”

“Good. Now are you going to tell me who he is?”

“No.” This conversation was straying into dangerous territory. Friend territory. Cas didn’t want to be friends with anybody who could make or break his career.

“Okay.”

But Harding’s prying didn’t let up. Cas was intubating an unconscious patient when Harding asked him for details again. It was uncomfortable to be on the receiving end of such unprofessionalism coming from his boss, his teacher, so he shut the subject down and fled to a more boring patient as soon as he got the chance.

A ten minute coffee break ending eight minutes early was a blessing in disguise. Harding would not stop prying. Cas took refuge in his work, but all too soon he found himself scrubbing in for a difficult and very rare surgery. Harding was the most experienced Trauma surgeon at the hospital, so of course she was in charge. He could only hope that she had remembered her professionalism by now, or at least that the surgery would keep her occupied enough not to ask him about his personal life.

And of course he had no such luck. The first three hours were simpler than Cas had expected, giving Harding plenty of time to bother him. Time dragged on, each second feeling like an eternity.

“Who is he?”

“No.”

“Suction. Who is he?”

“No.”

“Is ‘no’ the only word you know, Cas? Who is he?”

“No.”

Three hours. Three hours of that. Cas was about ready to take a scalpel and slit his own throat when the surgery finally got interesting and Harding took more of an interest in working than Castiel Novak’s personal life. That last hour was beautiful, but while Cas was stitching up the incision, Harding decided to start annoying him again.

“Everyone in the hospital knows you’ve fallen for someone, Cas,” she informed him, trying puppy eyes and pleading now that pure stubbornness had proven to be useless. “We all want details!”

“Well, I don’t want to be gossiped about,” Cas snapped, finishing up the final suture and stepping away from the patient. “My shift ends in five minutes. I’m going to do my final rounds, and you’re going to leave me alone. If I’m late-”

“You have a date, then?”

“None of your business.” He pushed through the OR doors and stripped his gloves off, then started to wash his hands.

Harding decided to use the sink right next to his. “Think you’ll have a date for the Christmas party?”

“I’m working,” Cas said flatly. “I won’t be attending the party.” He cut the water and turned away, ignoring Harding when she called after him. Ignoring her so hard he didn’t even know what she said.

 

His mood was rubbing off on his patients. The more-than-a-little-insane patient in 201 wasn’t strapped to his bed, indicating that the guy was more sane than usual today, but the instant Cas walked in he had to back out again and slam the door, holding it shut while the crazed man fought to open it. Cas decided the nurses could deal with that one, locked the door, and moved on. He didn’t particularly feel like getting stabbed with a pencil on top of everything else today.

The lady in 205 was normally sweet, but she was short with him today, snapping at him when he asked her how she was feeling and throwing her muffin at him as he left.

The man in 208 just glared at him, didn’t say a word, and Cas found that quite unnerving. It was more frightening, honestly, than the crazy guy in 201 who was bent on homicide-by-pencil.

By the time he got to room 300, he just wanted to make the nurses or an intern do his rounds. He kept going, because 300 was his last.

And Betty was back.

Cas wasn’t sure whether he was pleased to see her or disappointed that she was back in hospital. She took one look at him and opened her arms for a hug.

“Are you alright, dear?”

Cas nodded. “I’ve had a long day. My boss is… friendlier than I’m comfortable with. And she’s a gossip. She’s been pestering me all day. My mood is rubbing off on my patients. I’ve been attacked by four of them - four - and only one is actually insane. I’m looking forward to a couple of beers tonight.”

Betty nodded sagely. “Sometimes after a bad day the best thing to do is have a nice big glass of wine and relax in the bathtub.”

Cas nodded, reading through Betty’s chart. “You fell again?”

“Yes, dear. My poor sweet Pandora likes to be underfoot. I tripped over her. The nice young lady doctor told me my new hip needs to be checked.”

“Pandora’s your Pomeranian, right?”

“You remembered!”

It broke Cas’s heart that a doctor remembering a detail like that could draw such delight from a patient. To him it seemed a basic human fact and not to remember that a patient had a dog was not far short of criminal. “Of course I did, ma’am,” he said humbly. He stepped back from the old lady’s hug - which had been a lot longer than he had intended - and smiled, marking down everything the machines she was hooked up to read out and then reaching up for the blood pressure cuff.

Something pinged in his shoulder. It wasn’t that bad, so he ignored it and finished Betty’s checkup, bowing out of her room with another smile.

 

Cas was late. Dean couldn’t stop pacing. He could feel Sam’s eyes following him, but didn’t care. Cas. Was. Late.

Cas wasn’t the type to be late.

Dean couldn’t shake the thought that maybe something had happened to him.

“Dude,” Sam said. “Chill.”

“He works too hard,” Dean said. “What if he’s sick again? What if he fell asleep driving? What if he decided to pick up a hitchhiker, got carjacked, and is lying injured in a ditch?”

“Dean.”

“What?!”

“He works in a hospital. Maybe they needed him for an emergency.”

“Yeah but what if-”

“DEAN!”

“Okay, okay!” Dean cracked open another beer and chugged it. Sam took the bottle opener away from him and put it up on the very highest shelf in the kitchen, which Sammy could reach easily but Dean could not.

“You’re not getting drunk tonight. You have work in the morning,” Sam reminded him.

“Fuck work!”

“Can you really afford to lose your job, Dean? I know Bobby would take you on but hell, he can barely pay his own wages!”

Dean went back to pacing. He hated it when Sam was right.

The muffled roar of a powerful engine sent him scrambling for the front door. He flung it open and there was Cas’s dazzling smile. Dean stood there grinning like an idiot for quite a while, unable to find any words.

“Hello, Dean,” Cas said. He looked tired, Dean thought, but mostly seemed to be in a good mood.

“Hey, man! We’re set up for _Halo_  this week but if you want to play something else-”

“I’m not a gamer, Dean. I don’t know what _Halo_ is. But if you think I’d enjoy it, I’ll give it a go.”

Cas said his name an awful lot, Dean realized. “We’ll play one game and then if you aren’t having fun, we can try something else. We don’t just have first person shooters. I like racing games best, but Sammy’s been hanging out for a _Halo_ night for months.”

“Sounds like a plan.”


	10. Dean And Castiel Sitting In A Tree

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shorter one this time, guys, sorry. I'm kind of tired.
> 
> Anyway, hopefully you like.
> 
> There are gaming references in this so if anyone doesn't understand I would be happy to clarify.

Cas was very aware of how close Dean was getting, and how every time the guy got up to get another beer, he sat down just a little bit closer. They were playing two-player, what Dean had called “split-screen co-op campaign”, and Dean was a lot better than Cas was. His character died once in five levels. Cas died at least five times every level, but Dean was a good sport about it.

Sam had retreated to another room, complaining that having a split-screen game going on right next to his screen while he played “ranked matchmaking” games was distracting. Cas suspected that Sam actually left because he wanted his brother to feel comfortable drifting closer and closer to another guy. And that was easier if there wasn’t a third wheel sitting in the same room.

It didn’t matter. There was an alien pointing its gun at Cas, so Cas shot it until it died. Dean edged a little closer. Cas nearly dropped his controller when their knees touched, and his character died again. This time because of a twitch of a control stick. Cas literally walked off a cliff.

“Fail,” he said. He’d picked up some gaming slang from listening to Dean and Sam argue playfully over Sam’s ranked games. A ‘fail’ was when the player did something really dumb and died because of it.

Dean chuckled and Cas did drop his controller at the sensation of breath on his ear. Thankfully he hadn’t come back to life yet, so it didn’t make him die again.

He came back to life and started playing again, forgetting about Dean for a few moments and concentrating on shooting all the aliens. The little short ones didn’t take much. One or two shots and they were dead. Dean was the one killing all the bigger ones, but that was okay by Cas. He kept dying when he tried to take on anything bigger and deadlier than ‘Grunts’.

Suddenly Dean was behind him - literally behind him, not in-game - and Cas tried really hard not to be distracted by that, but in the end he died again.

There was a breathy chuckle in his ear and his insides turned to mush.

“You’re doing better than I did when I first started,” Dean’s bedroom voice said. Cas suppressed the shiver that ran down his spine and forced himself to focus on the game again.

Dean only had one hand on his controller - the other one was on Cas’s waist - and still had no trouble killing all the aliens Cas couldn’t. “I find that hard to believe,” he said, his voice trembling a little.

“You are.”

“I have a good teacher.”

Lips. On his cheek. Cas fought off an urge to squeal like a schoolgirl. “Dean. Concentrate, Dean. There’s an alien pointing his gun at you, Dean.”

The lips on his cheek smiled, and the alien died when something blue and glowing stuck to its chest exploded.

A grenade.

Of course Dean had that planned all along. He sighed, feeling stupid.

Suddenly the pause menu came up on the screen. _Paused by P1: WinchesterImpala_. Cas wondered why, but before he could ask, Dean’s controller was in his lap and his chin was held in one strong, callused hand.

 

Dean wasn’t sure what he was doing or why, but he didn’t want to resist. Cas’s stubbly chin was rough and - God help him - sexy in his hand. He shifted so that he was in front of Cas, on his knees and leaning forward, supporting his weight with his free hand. He couldn’t take his eyes off Cas’s bottom lip, and he was pretty sure the guy was holding his breath.

He paused, biting his lip nervously, and then when Cas let out a faint whimper he forgot about being uncertain. He’d made his decision regarding Cas hours ago. He’d bought the fucking rose, hadn’t he?

He pulled back, and Cas breathed again. Barely. Dean grinned and got up. “Want another beer?”

“Y-yeah,” Cas murmured.

 

What… what… wait… what?!

Cas wanted Dean to come back. Needed him to come back. Now. He had been certain Dean was about to kiss him. Absolutely certain. And it hadn’t happened. It wasn’t fair, he  couldn’t breathe, Dean had stolen his breath and for what?!

He leaned forward and put his face in his hands, trying to figure out how the hell he felt about that. Was he pleased? Was he disappointed? Hurt? What? He wasn’t sure. It was the first time in a very long time he hadn’t been sure of his own feelings. He knew he was head over heels for Dean but past that…

And then Dean returned. With two beers. And one perfect blue rose. Cas nearly died of happiness.

Dean settled himself back on the floor behind Cas, put one beer in between Cas’s legs and then held the rose for Cas to take. “So, um, I’m not actually sure how I’m supposed to ask this… but… d’you… d’you wanna go to, um, d- um…”

Cas squeaked out a strangled, “Yes!”

And suddenly he was surrounded by Dean’s warm arms, with Dean’s mouth on his, and it was the best thing ever.

“Finally,” said Sam from the doorway.

Dean and Cas jumped apart, both their faces flushed.

“I won my ranked tourney,” Sam said. “So I thought I’d come back, but if you two would rather be alone…”

“Fuck off, Sammy,” Dean growled, holding onto Cas possessively. Sam fled as Dean pelted him with beer bottle lids, and Cas couldn’t stop grinning.

 

Cas had the best smile. Dean couldn’t take his eyes off it. He’d been freaking out about asking Cas out all damned day, and especially about how he would feel afterwards, but this was… this was good. Better than he’d expected. That wonderful plump bottom lip… he just wanted to kiss Cas, suck on that lip, make his angel moan…

Cas, meanwhile, was holding both controllers in one hand, with his head tilted and one eyebrow raised. Dean forced his thoughts back towards gaming and grinned. “Gaming and cuddles?”

“Best idea ever,” Cas said.

 

After a couple of hours, Cas had gotten pretty damn good. Dean had bumped up the difficulty a few times and they were now playing on Legendary difficulty, with Cas holding his own admirably.

Dean was in a bit of a sticky situation, surrounded by the Flood and running very low on ammo. His heart pounded in his chest and his hands furiously worked the controller, bordering on button-mashing. He never survived if he got into this sort of situation. Never.

And then in came his knight in shining MJOLNIR. Cas rescued him with a few well-placed shotgun shells and all went quiet.

Dean pressed pause and stood up to stare at Cas, who looked up at him, confused. Dean just held out his hand, offering no explanation. Cas took it and stood up.

And Dean pushed him into a wall and kissed him hungrily. Cas’s mouth was tense in surprise at first, but softened under Dean’s assault, and then suddenly matched him for passion. Fuck tender kisses, this was way better. Dean’s hands knotted themselves into Cas’s hair. Cas’s hands gripped Dean’s hips, pulling them towards his own, and finally Dean heard that low moan he so wanted. Half-hard already, he pressed himself against Cas’s hip, his left hand slowly making its way down the doctor’s toned back.

Cas’s fingers fumbled at his buttons. Dean slipped his hand up underneath Cas’s scrubs, teasing his angel’s lips with his tongue. Those lips parted and Dean started to explore his Cas’s mouth, learning every detail. The crooked tooth that didn’t show when the doctor smiled, the little scar on the side of his tongue…

Cas finally succeeded in getting Dean’s shirt unbuttoned and oh, god, the guy was good with his hands…

“WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING?!”

Dean froze.

Dad was home.

Early.

Fuck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sammy's gamertag is MooseJess! :D


	11. Dean Versus John

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm a bad person.

Cas stood completely still, paralyzed by fear, for a few seconds before his brain processed the fact that Dean was cowering into his side and John still stood in the doorway, fury, shock and disgust rolling off the man in waves.

He stepped away from Dean, squaring his shoulders. A jolt of adrenaline ran through his system. Dean wasn’t going to stand up for himself, so someone had to.

“Kissing, and what the fuck is wrong with it?” Cas growled. He was about an inch shorter than John, but right then he felt ten feet tall. “If I was a girl, would you have a problem with it?” Dean tugged at his wrist, a desperate warning to back down _now_. Cas ignored it. “If the church can accept gays - the fucking _Christian Church_ \- then why can’t you? Homosexuality is a sin, well, so’s wearing cotton and polyester together. So’s shaving your beard or cutting your fucking hair. Getting a divorce-” Cas couldn’t help a vicious smile when John’s expression darkened at that “-or sleeping with someone you aren’t married to. Lying. Assault or murder. And you damn near murdered Dean, I’d know, my boss is the one who put him back together!”

John regained his determination and took a step forward. Cas mirrored it. Their faces were inches apart.

“Get out of my house, you goddamned homo,” John snarled, hands curling into fists.

Cas was about to growl a clever retort when Dean hugged him from behind.

“Don’t you fucking talk to my boyfriend like that,” Dean whispered. Cas shivered; he had never heard such a cold promise of death in another person’s tone. Ever.

“Your boyfriend?” John was horrified; Cas found his expression quite amusing, honestly.

“You heard me!” Dean let Cas go and shouldered him out of the way, towering over his father. “If you raise one piss-weak hand to either of us I swear to God I will fucking end you. You need to get the fuck out of my love life. Sam’s, too, while you’re at it. Jess is good for him. He’s fucking happy, you asshat, and don’t you dare quote his schooling as a reason for him to break up with her. She helps him fucking study and because of her his grades are up twenty percent.”

“I didn’t raise my son to be a fucking fairy faggot!”

Dean’s face went blank. Pure black rage sparked in his eyes. Cas had seen this before - something had snapped within him. Fear was gone. Dean slammed John into a wall and held him a foot off the ground by the collar. “You didn’t fucking raise me at all! You’re never here. I had to raise Sammy my-fucking-self and if you bothered to even try you only ever got in the way!”

Cas was absolutely certain he was about to witness a brutal murder. Sam was cowering at the top of the stairs, too afraid to intervene but too afraid not to watch. It amazed Cas that such a tall boy could be reduced to such a small, trembling puppy. There was a wet crunch and his attention snapped back to Dean.

There was blood. Dean’s nose was obviously broken, but Dean had both John’s wrists in one hand, pinned against the wall, and was still holding the man up with his other hand. Holding him up and strangling him.

Cas cursed under his breath. No matter what John had done, no matter that this argument was likely the straw that broke the camel’s back, nothing was worth Dean going to prison.

Dean’s face contorted into a feral snarl. There was absolutely no humanity left. An impulse to turn and run nearly defeated Cas’s approach, but he managed to squash it, putting one trembling hand on Dean’s shoulder.

“He’s not worth it,” he said.

Dean stared at him blankly, as if the words didn’t make any sense. Cas stared back, forcing himself to focus on how much he loved those green eyes when they were soft with humanity rather than how much they terrified him now, two hard chips of jade sharp enough to slice through pretty much anything. And slowly, humanity started to return.

There was a thump and a desperate gasp for air. Cas didn’t look away from Dean’s eyes.

“I should kill him,” Dean said calmly. Too calmly.

Timidly, Cas reached up to touch his cheek, hand still trembling. “He’s not worth going to prison over, babe.”

“You are.” Dean’s eyes flashed. “How _dare_ he speak to you that way!”

“Dean.” Cas stroked Dean’s cheek. “Please. You’re scaring Sam. You’re scaring me.”

 

That gave Dean pause. Nothing else had, but that… scaring Cas… “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” he murmured, hugging Cas tight.

“Dean- can’t- breathe-!”

Too tight, apparently. Dean relaxed his arms a little. “Sorry. Better?”

“Better.”

He wasn’t the sort to cry from pain or when he was angry but the dam suddenly burst. His vision blurred and his breath hitched. “Cas,” he said thickly. “Cas.”

“I know. It’s okay now. You’re okay.”

“I nearly killed a man.” The true realization of that fact struck home so hard that Dean actually stopped breathing for a moment. “I nearly killed him, Cas. I would have. I could have.”

“You didn’t.” Cas was so… so calm. It wasn’t fair. How could Cas be so calm when Dean was going to pieces like this? But at the same time he knew he needed that calm port when everywhere he looked within himself was so tumultuous he thought he was going to drown.

“I know, but- Cas, I nearly- fuck, if you hadn’t been here I’d have killed him!”

Someone cleared his throat. Dean remembered then that Dad was still here.

“Dean,” John rasped. “Get out. Before I have Sam call the cops.”

Dean didn’t know where he was supposed to go. Bobby couldn’t put him up. He was just going to have to sleep in his car… “Let me get some stuff.”

“You have half an hour.”

He nodded, numb. There was no point in fighting it. If Dad wanted him gone… then Dad wanted him gone. “Sammy… Sammy, you gon’ be okay without me?”

“I’ll be fine,” Sam said.

“I have a spare room,” Cas volunteered.

Dean didn’t know how to feel. He didn’t think he had any feelings left. He just nodded again and trudged towards his room.

 

Cas didn’t know what to say or do. This wasn’t Dean… it was wrong. Something was broken. He just followed in silence, and once they got to Dean’s room, helped Dean stuff clothes into a bag.

No one spoke.

Muffled voices drifted up from the kitchen, Sam talking to John. Dean needed his nose set, but Cas suspected it would be better to wait until they weren’t in this house to broach that subject.

Dean suddenly stopped, his back to Cas. It took Cas a moment to realize; his attention had been on the clothes and keeping them neat so that they could fit more in the bag.

Those beautiful broad shoulders were shaking. Cas forgot about the bag and the clothes and took two long strides to Dean’s side. He put one hand on his boyfriend’s shoulder.

Suddenly Dean’s hands were all over him and his back was pressed against a wall with the corner of Dean’s desk pressing into his hip painfully. Cas wanted to submit and let Dean forget about himself for a while but it was wrong, it wouldn’t help anything and they would both feel bad later.

He pushed Dean away. “No.”

“Why?”

“Not now,” Cas said softly. “Your nose is broken. You’re still upset. It won’t help anything.”

“Cas-”

“No.”

“But Cas…” Even Dean’s voice was wrong. There was so much rage boiling just beneath the spookily calm surface. Cas slipped out of Dean’s arms and sat on the bed, arms crossed, watching.

“We both need some time to chill out after all that,” he said, stuffing the last of the clothes into the bag. “Is there anything else? A laptop, your xbox?”

“I use Sam’s computer…”

“We’ll get the xbox then, and if you need to use a computer, you can use mine. The sooner we’re out of here the better.” Cas got off the bed and slung the bag over his shoulder, taking Dean’s hand and squeezing it. “You’ll be okay. You’ll be fine.”

Dean nodded again, but it wasn’t in agreement. That was a numb nod. Another numb nod. Cas refused to let on just how worried he was, but he thought if Dean wasn’t himself by tomorrow, he might suggest a visit to a psychologist. There was no shame in seeking help.

 

“Give me the keys,” Cas said.

Dean closed his fingers around his Chevy keyring and shook his head stubbornly. “Nobody drives Baby but me. I don’t even let Sammy or Bobby in the driver’s seat, and no one looks after a car as well as those two. No one.”

He understood why Cas wanted to drive. He was scaring himself with this numbness. But he was fine to drive.

“Dean…”

“You need to get your car home,” Dean said lamely. It was an excuse, and a pathetic one at that.

“Sam can drive it. It’d get him out of the house for a while.”

Cas really didn’t know how perfect he was, Dean thought. But Cas wasn’t driving Baby. “Sam can drive Baby, then.”

“Fine, but you’re riding with me.”

“Cas-”

“I didn’t ask. That would imply you had a choice in the matter.”

Damn stubborn pain in the ass doctor! Dean sighed. “Fine.”

Cas smiled, and Dean knew it was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen, but he didn’t feel anything. He tried to, but the only feeling he found was that overwhelming rage that had almost made him kill Dad, so he shoved that away and clung to the numbness. Numbness was better. Numbness was safer than killing someone.

He threw Baby’s keys to Sam, who caught them and slipped into her driver’s seat. It was wrong. Dean wanted to stop his brother from driving his car, but he just sighed and let Cas push him into the Camaro’s passenger seat.

He didn’t have a choice, he reminded himself. Dad had kicked him out. Sammy had to fend for himself now.

Dean let his shoulders hunch forwards. He should feel good, having finally stood up to Dad. He should be proud of himself. Instead… everything was just… not right.

A sob shook its way free of his chest. Cas put a hand on his thigh, looking at him worriedly. Dean just shook his head.

No. He wasn’t okay.


	12. Enter Balthazar Angeles

“No, you don’t understand,” Cas whined into the phone, watching Dean’s sleeping form. “His brother’s at school and I can’t leave him on his own…”

"Castiel, you're needed," Harding said with a stern voice. "There’s nobody to cover for you, and worrying about your boyfriend isn’t a good enough reason to skip work.”

“Tracy, please…” He hated using her first name, but he really needed to draw on her desire to be his friend.

“Cas, we’re understaffed as it is. I’m sorry. We need you here.”

“Not as much as Dean needs me now,” he growled. “Look, I’m sorry, write me up if you want. Hell, sack me if you want. I don’t care. Dean’s more important than my career.”

“Cas-”

“No. I won’t risk him. If he’s okay later, I’ll come in. But I can’t make any promises. I just… I need to be here when he wakes up. He was a mess when he fell asleep and his nightmares woke me a few times-”

“Will you shut the hell up and listen? If you’re that worried about him I can send a psychiatric nurse around. Psych is quiet.”

“Thanks, but I’ll be distracted all day anyway and-”

“And you’re a better doctor distracted than half the other Residents put together. Come to work.”

“Fine. But I’m only leaving after the nurse gets here.”

“You’ll still get here on time,” Harding said. “I already paged Psychiatric. They’re sending Balthazar Angeles.”

Balt was the best psych nurse this side of anywhere. That helped. Cas sighed and stroked Dean’s cheek. “Okay. I’m just… I’m so scared for him…” Cas trailed off, voice cracked. “Something broke in him last night. It reminds me of Anna… too much.”

Anna was okay now but it had been a long, hard road, for everyone. The depression, the drugs, the… the suicide attempts…

“You never did tell me about your sister,” Harding commented. “Sounds to me like you need work. You’re no good to anyone if you’re worrying yourself sick.”

“Mm,” Cas agreed vaguely.

Dean rolled over and grunted something incoherent.

“Anyway,” Cas said, “I need to go, y’know, get ready for work…”

“Go,” Harding said. The line went dead and Cas slipped his phone back into his pocket. He walked over to the wall and ran his thumb over a rip in the wallpaper with a sigh. If this was hard for him, he couldn’t imagine how hard it was for Dean.

His phone rang again. He didn’t recognize the number, but he picked up anyway.

“Novak.”

“Castiel, don’t hang up on me.”

Cas nearly did. John. “How the fuck did you get my number?”

“Dean left his phone behind… I’ll drop it at the hospital later… but uhhh…”

The man sounded honestly nervous. Cas couldn’t muster a lot of sympathy for him. “Spit it out.”

“Can you put Dean on?”

“He’s asleep.” He couldn’t keep the ice out of his voice. “He knew you were going to react the way you did. But you still managed to rip his damn heart out.”

“I… I’m calling to apologize…”

“Fuck you, John. _Fuck you_. You broke him, you asshole! I’d kill you my damned self instead of waiting for Dean to snap if I thought it’d do him any good!” Cas spat. He wasn’t sure why he hadn’t hung up yet.

The sharp intake of breath from the other end was frighteningly satisfying.

“You heard me,” he added in a lethal whisper. Finally, he hung up and turned off his phone. If the hospital wanted to reach him, they could do so via his pager. And his family knew his home number.

Dean stirred again, and Cas took a few deep breaths. He didn’t want Dean waking up in a room filled with anger. It wouldn’t help anything.

He closed his eyes and remembered gaming with Dean. The laughter and the teasing and the cuddles. That was… that was such a good few hours, a great night up until John Winchester had come home early and ruined everything.

“Cas?”

Cas opened his eyes. Dean was looking up at him with a dead expression. His heart broke in two. “Morning, handsome.”

Dean sat up. “Why’re you so worried about me? I’m fine.”

He wasn’t. It was plain as day. “Dean… I’m going to tell you something nobody in this town knows. Are you listening?”

Dean nodded.

“My sister killed a man. It was self-defense. He was going to rape her. But she went through… the same thing. She’s okay now. It was a long hard road but she’s alright now. You’ll get through this.” Cas helped Dean to his feet and then pulled him into a hug. “I have to get ready for work. My pager number is on the fridge if you need me, and one of my colleagues will be here while I’m gone. Balt is great, you’ll like him. Maybe you two can game for a while.”

“Why?”

There were a lot of questions in that one word, Cas thought. More than the obvious. “Because I love you.”

“Why, though?”

Cas squeezed Dean a little tighter, careful not to put too much pressure on his ribs. “Because you’re you. Never forget that. Okay?”

“Okay…” Dean didn’t seem convinced, but Cas couldn’t afford to think about that now. He needed to be able to focus at work. He had done his best, and Balt would be here. It was going to be okay.

 

Cas had been gone for an hour when Dean finally decided to speak to Balthazar Angeles.

“So you work with Cas?”

“Yeah,” Balthazar said with a chuckle. “He’s a very good doctor. More than that, he’s a good man. You’re lucky to have him.”

A spark of jealousy made Dean’s head snap up. “You dated him.”

“I wanted to. He was a patient, and then when he wasn’t anymore, he made his lack of interest… quite clear.” Balt smiled. “It was quite a while ago. Don’t worry. He’s yours.”

Dean nodded. “Damn straight he is. I nearly fucking killed my own father for his sake.” Balthazar didn’t flinch. Impressed, Dean continued. “Dad hates gays. He was talking shit to Cas. About both of us, but more about Cas. I guess I just… snapped.”

“Your desire to protect him is admirable,” Balt said. Dean’s jaw hit the floor, and then Balt saw fit to clarify. “Your choice of actions in doing so was not the best, but you’ll never move on if you don’t realize they came from a good place. If you don’t move on, the guilt will destroy you. I’ve seen it a lot. Not always stemming from the same actions as yours. Mothers giving up their babies often regret it later on. The way you feel right now - and I can read you better than you think - is very common. It doesn’t have to consume you.”

Dean lifted a shoulder in half an apathetic shrug. “I didn’t ever once do it for Sammy. My brother. My little brother wasn’t important enough for me to try to kill Dad.”

“Cas told me you took quite a beating for Sam. You protected him better than most people ever would.” Balthazar’s voice was annoyingly soothing. Dean didn’t want to be soothed.

“I guess… Will you shut up? I don’t want your help. I just want Cas.” It wasn’t until he said the words that he realized it was true. He sighed and sat down on the floor in front of the TV, turning it and his xbox on. “Feel like a game? It looks like Sammy dropped most of mine off this morning. He’s a good kid.”

Balt grinned. “If you have _Halo_ , I hope Cas warned you I beat the American champion last week.”

“That’d be my brother. MooseJess?”

Balt nodded. “He was damn good. I just got in a few lucky headshots. I’d say we were evenly matched.”

“I’m WinchesterImpala. Not as good as Sammy, but I can hold my own.”

 

There was laughter coming from the house when Cas finally got home. It stopped suddenly as he got out of his Camaro. Using his phone as a flashlight, he headed towards the front door, and was almost there when someone big and warm slammed into him with a tight bear-hug.

“You’re home!” Dean crowed. For a moment Cas was able to forget about his worry. Dean seemed happy.

Then it hit home. Dean seemed too happy.

“Yes,” he said softly. “I’m home. How was your day?”

“Balt kept psychoanalyzing me,” Dean complained. “Other than that it was okay. He kicked my ass at _Halo_ , so I kicked his ass at _Forza_. Sam came over for a bit after school, but he was with Jess and I think he could tell that they were annoying me. They didn’t stay long. What about you, how was work?”

“He’s Balt already, is he?” Cas said with a smile. “Work was interesting. Harding had me scrub in on this really complex surgery. Patient’s horse had a fall while jumping and rolled over the top of her. Lots of internal damage. It was touch and go for quite a while and I doubt she’ll ever ride again. If she ever has kids she’ll need a caesarian. Her pelvis was a mess and when it heals it won’t expand to let a baby through. We had four surgeons from Ortho working with us and then the head of Cardiothoracic and Charlie as well. Eight surgeons is a lot, it was great, all these new challenges that come with having so many people working on the one patient. We still don’t know if she’ll walk, but the head of Ortho was optimistic that if she has the determination, she’ll be able to live independently.” He paused, then flushed. Dean didn’t care about a surgery that Cas had enjoyed performing. “Sorry, I’m just still buzzing from it, I learned so much.”

“Shut up and keep talking,” Dean said, apparently oblivious to the fact that doing both was impossible. “I need to hear your voice.”

“Oh, Dean…” Cas hugged him. “I wish I could make things better for you.”

“You do, babe. You do.”

“Not enough.”

 

Blood. So much blood. Dean stood with a knife in his hand, eyes wildly flicking from the pool of blood on the floor to the smears up the walls. How the hell was he supposed to clean up this mess without leaving evidence? He watched crime shows sometimes but they never explained much about the process of hiding a murder.

How was it possible for so much blood to come out of one human being?

He nudged the dark-haired corpse with one foot. The Mafia liked to encase their corpses’ feet in concrete and dump them in the river. Dean didn’t have time for that. He could already hear the sirens. He was screwed… he was fucking _screwed_.

The cops entered in slow motion, kicking the door down and pointing their guns at him. Dean dropped the knife and reached for the sky. Something about the surreal quality of the lead cop’s movement told him this wasn’t real.

It was okay, then. It was okay. It wasn’t real, so it was okay.

One cop cuffed him and turned him to face the corpse while another turned it over.

And it wasn’t Dad.

“NO!” he screamed, thrashing against the cuffs, thrashing against the cop who held him and the three who came to help restrain him.

“Dean Winchester, you are under arrest for the murder of Castiel Novak-” this was a nightmare this was a nightmare it wasn’t real _it wasn’t fucking real WHY COULDN’T HE WAKE UP_ “-and anything you say or do can and will be used against you in a court of law-”

“CAS!”

He awoke panting, drenched in a cold sweat. Oh, God. Oh, God. It wasn’t real. It was just a dream. Just a horrible nightmare.

Dean swore violently under his breath, feeling ill. It was just a nightmare but it was so fucking vivid and _oh god he killed Cas_! Shaking, he got out of bed and stumbled for the door. Cas. He had to make sure Cas was okay.

He had every intention of padding silently to Cas’s room, but he found himself sprinting as if his life depended on it. Maybe it did. He knew he was capable of murder. He wasn’t sure he could survive the idea that he might be capable of hurting Cas.

He burst into Cas’s room. A sleepy Cas was just sitting up, reaching for the light on his bedside table.

“Dean?”

“I dreamed… I dreamed… oh, God, Cas, I dreamed I- fuck… I had to make sure… it wasn’t real…”

“Dean, you need to breathe. Breathe in for me now. Nice and deep.” Cas slid out of bed. Part of Dean’s mind registered vaguely that he slept naked.

He tried to breathe, but his throat constricted around the breath. He couldn’t.

“Come on, honey, breathe,” Cas said again. He was trying to keep his voice calm and even, Dean could hear it, but not having much success.

The edges of his vision went grey. He still couldn’t breathe in. His heart was racing a million miles an hour and he couldn’t fucking _breathe_ and oh, god, he’d just killed Cas in his dream and _fuck if he didn’t breathe he was going to pass out_ but he couldn’t, he just couldn’t…

“Breathe, Dean. Breathe.” Cas reached his side and rubbed his back gently. “You’re going to be okay. This is a panic attack, have you ever had one before? They’re not much fun, I know, but you’re going to be fine.”

Dean nodded and, despite his lack of air, managed to choke out, “Cas…”

“I’m here, honey. I’m right here.”

The words came from a long way away. Grey faded to black. Dean felt his knees give out, and he felt Cas catch him, but not much else.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry I'M SO FUCKING SORRY BUT THE STORY NEEDS THIS


	13. Castiel Novak Tries His Best

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well... what can I say about this chapter except that it's been 12 chapters in the making?
> 
> My girlfriend helped me write this. She doesn't have an AO3 account, or I'd credit her properly!
> 
> More plottish stuff soon...

It was almost a relief when Dean passed out. Cas felt like a bad person for even thinking that, but the moment his bow-legged beauty lost consciousness, he breathed in. And seeing and hearing Dean breathe again was the sweetest relief in the world. He turned away long enough to put on jeans and a t-shirt, then returned.

Cas sat on the edge of his bed, watching Dean’s chest rise and fall with lovely deep breaths. He wasn’t sure how much of this he could take; he hadn’t lasted long with Anna before seeking therapy and the only reason he had survived her ordeal was Balt. Who wasn’t a fully qualified therapist… but Cas didn’t care. He’d seen therapists who weren’t nearly as skilled as the psychiatric nurse.

Dean’s whole body tensed. Cas’s eyes snapped to his face just as those wonderful green eyes opened.

“Feeling any better?” Cas asked him.

“I can breathe now,” Dean said. There was a lot of loathing in his tone and on his face, but it wasn’t directed at Cas.

“That’s a step in the right direction,” the doctor encouraged him. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“Not particularly, but I will. You need to know. Cas, I- I- in my dream, I killed you. Not Dad. You.” Dean swallowed. “I’m bad news, Cas. I’m fucked up and I don’t want to hurt you but I know I will.”

Cas laid his hand on Dean’s shoulder. “Some people are worth the risk.”

“Not me.” There was the loathing again.

“I’ll be the judge of that.”

“Shut up and kiss me.”

Cas knew Dean wanted to use sex to try to feel better about himself. He also knew it was probably a bad idea. But if this was all he could do for his burger-flipping beauty, then he really didn’t care. He crawled all the way onto the bed, straddled Dean’s hips, and kissed him, trying to put all the tenderness and passion he felt into it.

The kiss turned desperate within seconds. Dean’s hands tore at Cas’s shirt until the fabric gave way and it ripped down the front. Cas tugged at Dean’s short hair, sucking on his lower lip. A needy little moan escaped his throat. How the fuck did Dean’s touch get him so hot so fast? He was already more than halfway hard. He shoved Dean’s shoulders down onto the bed with a low growl and leaned down to kiss him again, a rough clash of mouths that was as much a battle as it was an expression of passion.

 

Cas’s lips were a welcome distraction from thoughts of his nightmare. Dean’s hands snaked around the doctor's back and pulled him closer. Needed him closer.

Fighting those cold memories with all the warmth Castiel could possibly give.

So much hate bubbled inside him.

But oh god, hands were going down his naked hips. Lower and lower.

“Cas... oh!” Dean was breathless.

And Cas wasn’t stopping there. He stared into Dean’s eyes, never breaking eye contact as he trailed light fingers over Dean’s inner thighs and back up again.

Those same fingers wrapped around Dean’s cock as Cas growled, “I fucking love you, and I swear to God, if you don’t stop hating yourself I’ll tie you to a chair.”

Dean groaned, half in pain. “The way I'm going... we’ll need that chair...”

He suddenly arched off the bed and let out a strangled moan as Cas brushed a sensitive area of skin. With Cas, he had found just a moment of peace. A quiet port in his raging storm.

“I’m taking note of that spot,” Cas commented, brushing it again.

Dean grunted in reply as he buried the back of his head deep into Cas’s pillow. Cas worked vigorously on his cock from above him, face etched into a beautiful look of concentration.

And an overriding lust.

The doctor suddenly looked up and into Dean’s darkening eyes.

“Touch me...” Dean challenged. “Make me forget...”

Cas replied with just a wicked grin, trailing his free hand over Dean’s chest and sides. There was a sweet spot right on Dean’s ribs, which half hurt, especially when Cas trailed his fingers over the plates holding them together. Another one on his collarbone, which Cas dipped his head to suck and lick, one hand still working Dean’s cock and the other looking for more sweet spots.

Cas’s hand skimmed over Dean’s nipple and Dean whimpered.

“F-...fuck!” He arched up, encouraging Cas to continue. Even when it hurt, Cas’s touch chased away the memories and forced him to think only of the dark-haired doctor. It was a distraction, and it worked exceptionally well. Winces turned into filthy moans, pre-cum dribbling out of his erection.

Dean bit his lip and shook from his high.

“Please... more!” he cried out.

Cas took his hand off Dean’s cock and kissed him roughly, both hands now straying across the sensitive spots he had found. A nipple was pinched, just enough to hurt in the most pleasurable way. One hand skimmed incredibly lightly over the place where Dean’s leg met his groin.

“You scared me, you know,” Cas growled. “What’re you gonna do about that?”

Dean couldn't speak, his heart racing wildly. He let out a weak wail and clawed at Cas' arms, digging his nails in lightly, rubbing desperately against the thigh sitting between his legs.

He was utterly and completely submissive now and would do absolutely anything Cas said, willingly, if only he had the breath to say so to those dark blue eyes.

Cas just chuckled and kept teasing, taking one nipple into his mouth with a luxuriant suckle. “Oh, come on, Dean, you’re going to have to do better than that. Make me beg.”

Dean refused momentarily. “C-Cas..!”

Cas chuckled again, a breathless and incredibly, unbelievably sexy sound. And when he spoke again, his voice was deeper and more seductive than Dean had ever heard it. “I’ve made you forget… now it’s your turn to make me forget. Make me forget my name, Dean!”

And that. Dean couldn't believe just how much that sentence could suddenly make him so energetic.

He bounced up a little awkwardly and lay Cas down, stripping the doctor’s jeans and boxers off roughly.

Those dark blue eyes were fixated on his green ones now.

“Alright,” he winced, “I'll let you forget…”

He bent down and, almost tenderly, kissed up Cas’s inner thighs.

Cas moaned and his eyes fluttered shut. Dean did so love the sounds Cas made, the soft moans and the little whimpers. The moans got more needy and the whimpers more pathetic the closer Dean’s lips got to Cas’s erection, and _God_ , it was huge.

“Dean-” Cas gasped, cutting himself off with a loud moan.

Dean realised what he was planning. He had no expertise in this area.

“Cas... this is... not my division...”

Cas smiled up at him.

And then, he read those eyes.

All he had to do was to pretend he was a woman.

He wrapped his lips around the head and worked himself down a little. Castiel’s cock was so fat and warm. He slowly stopped worrying.

Cas’s breath hitched and his hands flailed for a moment before finally landing on the back of Dean’s head, gently encouraging him to go deeper. “Hnn... fuck... Dean...”

The salty taste of pre-cum pooled on Dean’s tongue.

“Dean!” Cas’s voice had taken on a warning note. The member in Dean’s mouth twitched and hardened even more. Cas’s hands scrabbled at the back of Dean’s head, and Dean suspected that if his hair were longer, Cas might use it to pull his head away.

Dean swallowed even more of Cas, the smooth pulsing member sitting on his tongue comfortably.  
Dean grazed the sensitive skin with his teeth, humming as he pulled out a bit then continued in a steady motion.  
He was so distracted from bad thoughts, that the Winchester started humming _Smoke on the Water_ as he slowly mouth-fucked his doctor.

“Dean- D-Dean!” Cas let out a strangled cry, scrabbling at the back of Dean’s head harder. “C-close!”

Dean would not let himself go down further. He moaned against Cas and brought his hand up to stroke where he couldn't put his mouth.  
The other hand reached out to stroke the hollow in front of Cas’s hipbone.  
“Mmph-fuck…” Dean moaned.

“Dean, oh, god, Dean!” Cas whimpered. “Please! P-please- don’t- not- yet-!”

Dean slowed and pulled himself off, making sure he made a loud dirty pop as he released the aching member.

Cas whined something incoherent.

“Mm-yes?” Dean hummed, now lightheaded.

“Inside... me...” Cas gasped.

Dean rubbed his dick against Cas’s, using it as a lube. He wasn’t sure if he had enough, but he was too horny to care. He lined himself against Cas’s hole and slowly pushed himself inside. Cas rewarded him with a desperate moan.

“What’s your name, baby?” Dean asked breathlessly.

“C-Cas,” Cas gasped.

Dean moved, slowly at first, to bottom out inside Cas. Cas’s hips bucked and they both whimpered.

“Your- name-?”

“Cas!”

He pulled out slowly, then slammed back in, drawing a wordless cry from Cas’s throat. And he did it once more.

“Your name?”

 

Cas found he couldn’t remember. He whimpered pathetically and shook his head. The triumph on Dean’s face was the purest expression it had worn for days.

The fire at the base of Cas’s spine intensified as Dean moved inside him.

“Cas, oh Cas, fuck- Cas!” Dean groaned. Heat shot up Cas’s spine and fireworks exploded in his head as Dean  finished him off with a combination of hand on his cock and dick in his ass. Sticky white ropes spurted onto both their chests.

“Dean!” Cas shouted.

“Cas!” Dean bellowed, filling Cas up with warmth. He moved to pull out, but Cas stopped him with a hand on one hip.

Together, they drifted in blissful oblivion, basking in the afterglow. Cas only dozed, but Dean’s breathing slowed and settled and the last worry-creases in his brow smoothed out.

Finally, Cas thought. Finally Dean was getting some decent sleep.

“You’ll feel better tomorrow, baby,” he murmured, then started to sing sleepily. “If we believe...” Dean murmured something and snuggled closer to Cas’s chest. “We can’t lose...” Dean snuffled and then started to snore softly. “Even mountains will move...” Cas stroked Dean’s cheek, staring at him lovingly. “It’s my faith, it’s my life, this is our battle cry...”

Dean’s right hand twitched.

“They can’t take us down...” Cas let his own eyes drift shut. “If we stand our ground...” Sleep beckoned. He fought it, clinging to consciousness just to stay with Dean. “If we live, if we die...” The fight was futile. As Cas fell asleep, he mumbled the last line of the chorus, off-key and barely coherent. “We will shout out our battle cry...”


	14. Dean Winchester's Night Terrors

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just...
> 
> Don't hate me.
> 
> Okay?

Cas woke to Dean thrashing about like the world was ending. For him, Cas thought, it probably was. Dean was a lot more sensitive than he let on and he sure as hell wasn’t one of those people who could shrug off nearly killing a fellow human being.

Dodging flailing arms, Cas wondered what he was supposed to do now. How he could help. He had never quite been able to work that out with Anna’s nightmares and he didn’t know where to start now. He didn’t want to draw parallels between Dean and Anna - what with Anna’s spiral into drug abuse, depression, and suicide attempts - but the situation was nearly identical. The difference? Anna’s parents (Cas’s parents, he reminded himself) had been supportive. She had three brothers who’d done all they could to help her out. Everyone had been on suicide watch for months, never leaving Anna alone for more than five minutes at a time, and eventually, they’d all come out the other side relatively intact.

Aside from Cas’s occasional flashback nightmares, but even those were happening less and less often now.

Cas didn’t know how Dean’s struggle would affect him. He had a feeling he wouldn’t cope too well in the long run. He was okay for now… but he knew he would need Balt again. There was no escaping it.

Eventually, Dean settled again, trembling and sweating but no longer flailing. Cas sat watching him for a while, and then got out of bed and put his jeans back on, heading downstairs.

He never used the house phone unless he urgently needed to get a hold of Gabe. Now was one of those times.

“Fuck’s sake, Cas,” sixteen-year-old Gabriel complained at him. “It’s three A.M!”

“You remember what Anna went through?” Cas said. No time for standing on ceremony. He needed to talk about this and he needed to talk about it _now_.

“Yeah. But Cas-”

“I told you I’m with someone, didn’t I?”

“Where’s this going?”

“You’re on break from school, aren’t you?” Cas had lost track of the school terms. It wasn’t like he really needed to know when schoolkids were at school and when they were on break.

“No, next week I am, why? What’s this about? Cas?” Gabe’s voice was worried. “You okay?”

“I am. Dean isn’t. I need you to grab Michael and come stay with me for a while.” Cas was trying so very hard to keep his voice level. “Don’t tell Mom and don’t tell Anna, not the truth at least, just tell them I invited you guys to stay for a while.”

“Is this like that time when-”

“No,” Cas growled. “This is worse. This is Anna all over again and I don’t know what to do without you guys. You should focus on school for now. Wait until you’re out. But I need my brothers…”

“You can count on us,” Gabe promised. “I’ll get Michael to leave as soon as he can, and I’ll follow Friday night.” There was a pause, filled with nothing but silence. “Are you sure you don’t want Mom to know?”

“Gabe, I know you go to Mom for everything, but she’s… I don’t know. Too much for me. I feel like I have to handle her as much as I have to handle myself. You know Dad was always my go-to guy.” Cas sat on the kitchen counter, legs crossed. Muffled yells from upstairs told him Dean was in the throes of another nightmare. “I’m going to make an appointment to see Balt after work.”

“That bad, huh?”

“Not yet, but it will be.” Cas puffed out a sigh. “Soon. It’s worse with Dean. Same shit, different day… different person. I’m afraid he’ll go down the same track Anna did and if he does that… if he does that, Gabe, I don’t know if I’ll be able to keep him alive.”

“You sure you don’t need me to head out tonight? I can ditch, we’re just doing revision. Half the class isn’t even coming to school, their parents pulled them to go on vacation early…”

“No, Gabe, I’ll be okay for a few more days.” A change in the noise from upstairs alerted him to Dean being awake. “I have to go, he’s awake. I need to be with him.”

“You won’t be sleeping before work, will you?”

“Couldn’t if I wanted to,” Cas admitted. “See you in a few days.”

“Yeah. See ya.”

Cas hung up the phone and pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes. Sam needed to know how bad this was, but at this hour…? It could probably wait.

There was a crash from upstairs and Dean’s panicked voice calling, “Cas?!” propelled Cas off the counter and across the kitchen before he managed to regain his balance. He took the stairs four at a time, nearly tripped over his own feet at the top of them, and burst into his bedroom to see Dean sitting on the floor hyperventilating, surrounded by shards of glass from a broken lamp.

Ignoring the glass altogether, Cas plopped down next to him and started rubbing his back. “It’s okay, handsome, you’re okay. Breathe for me. You’ll make yourself sick if you don’t breathe. Nice and deep for me. In. And out. And in. And out. That’s better.”

Dean trembled. “I broke your lamp.”

“I don’t care. What’s the matter?”

“I killed Sam this time.”

 _God help him_ , Cas thought in silent prayer, _because Dean needs all the help he can get_. “They’re horrible and they’re vivid, honey, but they’re just dreams. It might help to talk to Balt about them.” He rested his head on Dean’s shoulder. “He helps me with mine, when they resurface.”

Dean straightened a little. “Yours?”

“I dream sometimes about the times I found Anna… after she tried to kill herself. It used to be every night. I know, it doesn’t sound… that bad… compared to dreams about killing people you care about, but I needed help to cope. Balt was already helping, because everything Anna was going through was hard on everyone. And then the dreams started up. Gabe and Balt are the only reason I survived long enough to find my salvation.” Cas trembled. He didn’t talk about this stuff with many people.

“Cas… don’t start with the religious crap, please…” Dean shifted away, but Cas shifted with him.

“I’m not saying you have to start believing there’s a God out there. Everyone’s salvation is different. It was religion for me, but it could be anything for you.” Cas shrugged. “Baby’s been looking a little lonely. She might like some attention while I’m at work. Just a suggestion.”

“I’ll take her out later,” Dean agreed.

“My brothers are coming to stay for a bit,” Cas said as casually as he could manage. “Gabe’s doing really well in school and Michael wanted to encourage him, so I said they could come for a vacation. Gabe’s a gamer too. Not as good as you, but better than me by a long shot. And if Michael brings Sparky, there’ll be two Impalas staying here. Sparky’s a little bit newer than Baby and quite a bit more weathered, but who knows, she might like him.”

“Okay,” was all Dean had to say. “You want me to clean up this mess?”

Cas shrugged. “I can do it, you should try to get some more sleep. I’m up now, and I have work in three hours, so I might as well stay that way. Balt’ll get here around seven.”

“Are you having me babysat?”

He couldn’t see any way around telling the truth. “I’m worried about you… if I could, I’d take time off work, but Harding won’t give me time off and if I take it anyway… that’s my career sunk.”

“I’m fine, Cas!”

“My lamp would beg to differ. Look, I’ve seen this before, with Anna, and we came very fucking close to losing her more times than I care to count. I don’t want to lose you.”

“Don’t be fucking ridiculous, Cas!” Dean snapped, leaping to his feet. “I’m not going anywhere. I swear.”

“Yeah, Anna said that, too,” Cas said. With that, he retreated, leaving Dean to his thoughts. He didn’t know how to handle this. He was trying, but he really honestly didn’t know.

The sound of a vacuum cleaner pierced the pre-dawn silence. Cas padded downstairs, flopped down on the couch, and turned on the TV, pressing ‘play’ on whatever the fuck blu-ray was in the player. It turned out to be the _Skillet_ concert Gabe had bought for him last year, and he found himself singing along to all the songs.

Especially _Battle Cry_.

He thought he heard Dean’s voice humming along, but he might have just been imagining things.

 _Please hear me, God_ , he prayed. _Dean is everything. Please help him_.

He could have sworn he felt someone pat his shoulder soothingly. It gave him hope again. Hope that everything would be okay.

 

Dean was sleeping when the doorbell rang. He rolled over and fell off the couch. “Fuck.” He paused, then raised his voice so that the other person could hear him. “Come in, Cas didn’t lock it.”

Balthazar poked his head around the door a little tentatively as Dean hauled himself back onto the couch. “Hi. Cas warned me you had a rough night.”

“Don’t want to talk about it,” Dean grunted, covering his eyes with one arm. “Just want to sleep.”

“Then you can sleep,” Balt said, shutting the front door and walking over to an armchair. “Mind if I use your xbox?”

“Go for your life.”

Dean fell asleep again to the sound of gunfire and dying aliens, and this time, his dreams were about killing aliens, not people. Much more pleasant. Just your average garden variety gamer dreams.

 

 


	15. Forgiving John Winchester

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Have a fluffy sort of less depressing chapter from me.
> 
> Sort of less depressing.
> 
> Kind of.
> 
> I'm still a horrible person.

Balt and Dean stared at each other in silence for an eternity before Dean finally cleared his throat, glanced down at the table, and started to talk.

“So, um, Cas told me that talking about his nightmares helped him. And I guess… if he can ask for help… so can I. So here goes nothing.”

Balt sipped his beer, waiting.

Dean took a huge gulp and continued. “I’m better than I was yesterday. Something still isn’t right and I can’t put my finger on it but when I’m awake I’m… I’m okay. But when I’m asleep…” He shuddered. “I have these… dreams. And there’s always something that tells me I’m dreaming but I can’t wake myself up and I can’t step back from them and just watch, I know it’s not real but it just… it feels real. It’s always the aftermath of a murder. I always know I’m the one who did it. There’ve been a few… they don’t all wake me up. Cas knows about two, but there are more. Always a different person. The first one was Dad, and that was… I hate myself… that was okay.” He paused again and took a deep breath and another swig of his beer. “Then it was Cas. That wasn’t okay. That was the first one that woke me. Then after that it was Bobby, then Jess - Sam’s girlfriend - then Mom. Then Sam. That one woke me too. And then just before you got here it was-” he cut himself off, faking a cough as an excuse for the self-interruption. “It was Mom again, I’m pretty sure. You woke me up before I could get a good look. Thanks for that.”

“Night terrors,” Balt mused. “Have you ever had them before?”

“Nightmares? Hasn’t everyone?”

“No, night terrors,” Balt repeated firmly. “They’re worse.”

Dean shook his head. “Never bad enough to wake me up. I had this one nightmare once, road-tripping with Sammy, that he reckons made me thrash so hard a cop stopped to book us for public indecency, thinking someone was having a fuck in my car. Like I’d ever let anyone fuck anyone in Baby! But that was… that was nothing on these. These make me wanna puke.”

Balt was silent for a long time. Dean looked up from the table to see him placing his hands flat, a thoughtful look on his face. “That’s unusual. Night terrors most commonly develop in children around eight to nine years old. They can come and go… often triggered by a traumatic event. Kids put their hands through windows, fall down staircases, even jump off fire escapes. Adults usually cope better, because they have more experience. Do you think it has anything to do with the events of Tuesday night?”

“Everything,” Dean growled. “I never had one before that happened.”

“Cas was the same,” Balt said with a nod. “Not one problem until the first time he found Anna. If I were actively treating you, with a case file, I’d be wondering about PTSD now. Cas had a moderate case. He’s almost completely over it now.”

“Hang on a second, what about doctor-patient confidentiality?”

“He gave me permission. Thought it would help you to know a few more details about the things he’s told you about. What I’m wondering is, are you the kind of person to find Tuesday’s events traumatic enough to trigger a stress disorder?”

Dean bit his lip. “Before then, I’d never even raised a hand in self-defense. I have a bit of martial arts training - Dad tried to force me into it - but I refused to spar. I’ve only ever punched and kicked targets and punching bags. And Dad. Nearly strangled Dad.”

“So you’d call yourself a peaceful person?”

“Relatively speaking.” Dean swigged his beer again. “Cas was… Dad was going spare and Cas was gonna get hurt. But… it wasn’t a thing that I had to do. It was a thing that I wanted to do. I enjoyed it. I’d like another shot at Dad… another chance to squeeze the life out of him…” Time to shut up now, before Balt decided he was dangerous and needed to be institutionalized. That was as bad as the thought of going to prison, if not worse.

“That’s normal for children of violent men,” Balt said, apparently nonplussed. “Most are like you - most avoid violence where they can. But if push comes to shove, if forced past his limits, a peaceful man is the most dangerous man on the planet. To the person who pushes him that far, and to himself. I doubt you would hurt anyone else.”

“Children… of violent… men…?” Dean gripped the edge of the table hard with both hands.

“Easy there, Dean. It’s just an observation. The whole town can see it.”

“Sammy’s not as fucked up as me, is he?” Suddenly Sam was the only thing that mattered.

“I don’t know. I haven’t spoken to him. From what you’ve told me, though, he seems well-adjusted.”

“Jess is good for him,” Dean mumbled. “He needs her. Not like I need Cas… not as a reason to keep going. He needs her because she’s the best thing that ever happened to him, and everything she does helps him be a better man. He’ll be a good father one day. Maybe even a great one.”

“You’re proud of him.”

“I raised him after Mom left. He was four. I was eight. I did a better job raising him than I did raising myself.” Dean swigged his beer again. “I kept him safe from Dad. I taught him how to be better than Dad. I don’t know what… what watching me take his beatings for him might have done to him… but… I don’t regret it. Not one bit. Sammy’s a good boy and he’s shaping up to be an even better man. I couldn’t bear to see him hurt. I couldn’t always protect him but I did redirect most of the worst…”

“Should your mother have taken you with her?”

“Hell no!” Dean shouted, standing. His chair clattered to the floor behind him. “She really fucked herself up. Last I heard she’s in rehab. Again. I don’t want Sam anywhere near that shit.”

“And yourself?”

“I would have been okay. I don’t have big dreams, Balt. I never did. I just want Sam to be happy. Sam wants law school and Jess and a big family, and if we hadn’t stayed with Dad, none of that would be possible. Dad’s the lesser of two evils for Sammy.”

“Dean Winchester, you are the most selfless young man I have ever met,” Balt said softly. “Even more so than Cas. That surprises me. I never thought I’d meet anyone as selfless as Castiel Novak and you’ve surpassed him.”

Dean went pink. He wasn’t used to being complimented.

“I don’t need to be babysat,” he said eventually. “I’m pretty sure Cas will lose his shit if you leave but… do you mind if I go out for a little while? I might take Baby to Bobby’s and bum around in his garage for a while.”

“I’ll tell him Bobby picked you up,” Balt said with a smile. “You aren’t nearly as messy as some I’ve seen. I don’t think you’re in any immediate danger from yourself.”

Dean cringed. Balt didn’t need to say the words to tell him that Cas was worried he might hurt himself. “Cas is overreacting.”

“Maybe. But I would advise you to humor him. This is stressful for him, too.”

“I have panic attacks now,” Dean said suddenly.

“That doesn’t surprise me. Would you like me to run you through some techniques to cope with them when you get back?”

“I’d appreciate that. Thanks, Balt.”

Cas’s pager beeped. He was with a patient, and it wasn’t urgent, so he ignored it for now and focused on his patient.

Trauma was dead quiet today so he was helping out in Paediatrics. His patient was a four-year-old who had stuffed a bead up her nose. Keeping her entertained while attempting to fish out the bead was proving challenging, but Cas was enjoying it despite himself.

“So you like boys?” the little girl asked him.

“Boys around my own age,” Cas clarified with a smile. “I have a boyfriend. His name is Dean. Do you have a boyfriend?”

“No, silly, I’m too little!” The girl giggled. “You don’t get boyfriends until you’re at least twenty, that’s what my daddy told me.”

“Your daddy is very smart. Boys don’t learn how to treat you right until they’re grown-ups.” Cas hooked the bead at last. “Ooh, I got it! This is gonna feel funny. You might feel like sneezing.” He pulled it out and dropped it into a sample jar, screwing on the lid. His patient sneezed twice.

“Thankee,” she said. “That feels much better! You’re the best! I wanna be like you when I grow up.”

Cas’s cheeks warmed. “You’re very welcome. You can take the rest of today off school, but you have to go back tomorrow, okay?”

“Okay! Byebye, Doctor No-vack!”

Cas couldn’t help but smile. It faded when he checked his pager.

Dean. Was. Not. With. Balt.

He was sure Bobby wouldn’t let him do anything stupid but damn it, there was a reason he wanted Balt around!

Cas allowed himself a five second private freakout before pushing his worries away and moving on to his next patient. This one was a cranky toddler with a fever. Another challenge. Just what he needed to keep his mind busy.

Something was still not right when Dean returned to the house. He had hoped that some time at Bobby’s would help clear the cobwebs and settle him down, and for a time, it had, but now that he was away from the garage, it was all back again. A little too much tension here, too little over there, as if something had snapped and something else was trying to take the strain.

He wanted Cas, but Cas was working. Sam was still at school.

He sat in his car for a while, listening to the silence, and then jumped when his phone rang. As always, he listened to it ring for the first four lines of the song - _Carry on my wayward son, there’ll be peace when you are done; lay your weary head to rest, don’t you cry no more_ \- before answering.

“Yeah?”

“I’m sorry, Dean. Please, hear me out-”

Dean hung up, glaring at his phone. No, he fucking _didn’t_ want to talk to Dad.

It rang again.

He stared at it for a while and then threw it out the Impala’s window into an overgrown garden bed. He didn’t want Dad’s apologies.

It wasn’t until two hours later, when Balt finally managed to convince him that he needed to let go of his anger, that he forced himself to listen to the voicemail that Dad left.

“I don’t deserve your forgiveness. I know that. I’ve hurt you so many times in so many ways. I just want you to know that I’m sorry, and… and you’re right. If you’ll give me another chance, I swear I’ll try to accept you and… and Castiel. Please, Dean. One more chance...” Dad’s voice trailed off into a sob, and then the recording ended.

Dean stared mutely at his phone, then replayed the voicemail with the phone on speaker on Balthazar’s request. He didn’t know how he felt about this… but Dad had never admitted to being wrong before. Ever.

Maybe the guy really wanted to try to change.

“Should I?” he asked Balt.

“It’s up to you. I’d recommend trying to make amends… but not before you’re ready. If you don’t feel like you can handle it, don’t push yourself. You’re stressed enough as it is.”

Dean nodded. He did want to give Dad another chance. Just not yet. Not… yet. “I’ll call him… explain…”

“Okay. I’ll be right here… and Cas will be back in about an hour.”

Surprised, Dean checked the time on his phone. Balt was right, it was nearly six. He dialled Dad’s number and walked through to the next room.

“Dean…”

“Dad,” he said carefully.

“Does this mean-”

“No. It means I want to tell you that I want to forgive you, but I can’t right now. I need you not to call me or contact me in any way. I won’t acknowledge you if I see you on the street. When I’m ready, I’ll contact you. Understood?”

“I’m sorry, Dean. I really am.”

“I know. It excuses nothing. But things will get pretty fucking awkward if I want to visit Sammy and you’re home, so - for Sam’s sake - I’m going to try. Meanwhile if you hurt him I will finish what I started.” He hung up and slipped his phone back into his pocket, heading back into the kitchen and sitting down heavily.

“Well done,” Balt said.

“That was exhausting,” Dean groaned, leaning forward to rest his head on his arms.


	16. Settling

Months passed. Dean’s nightmares lessened in frequency and severity, and he and Cas started to share Cas’s bed more and more often instead of sleeping in separate rooms.

There was still that little niggling something missing, but Dean found himself more and more able to ignore it as time went by. His talks with Balthazar got shorter and less taxing.

The first time Dean called Dad was just after the snowmelt.

“Dean!” Dad’s delight was unmissable.

“Hey, Dad. Cas and I were… we were wondering if you wanted to come to our cookout. Cas is a proper doctor now. We’re having a few people around to celebrate.” Dean was nervous about the idea, and it showed, but he had mostly forgiven Dad. “I’d… like you to meet his family.”

Dean had only recently met Cas’s sister. Ellen - Cas’s Mom - and the boys, Gabe and Michael, had visited occasionally over the past couple of months, but Anna, he hadn’t met until Cas took him six hours away to ‘meet the family’ properly. They were nice people. He didn’t know them well enough to have much more of an opinion than that.

“Dean…”

“You’d rather start smaller?”

“If… that’s okay?”

“We’ll be round Tuesday for gaming night as usual. I’ll tell Sam I’d rather he didn’t ask you to make yourself scarce.”

“Dean… Thank you.”

 

It was a tense little gathering. No one was able to get into the gaming, and Dad kept casting nervous glances at Cas. Dean figured it was a huge improvement on the last time he had been in this house. Dad was trying. It ended with hugs all round, except for Cas - he got a handshake from Dad and a kiss on the cheek from Jess.

Still an improvement.

The next gathering was a few weeks later. Cas, Dean, Dad, Sam, Jess, and Michael, who was in town for work. Dad and Michael got on famously.

“It’s wonderful watching John with my brother,” Cas said softly. “It’d be good if they ended up friends.”

“Dad might mellow out some more with you,” Dean agreed, watching Jess only pick at her steak. Nobody ever only picked at Cas’s steaks. As far as Dean was concerned, they were from God’s own plate.

Still, something was missing.

 

Summer came and went. Cas worked constantly, leaving Dean alone in the house often. Alone to his thoughts. He got a new job to get him out of the house more - working in a warehouse - but it didn’t help. By the beginning of fall, the nightmares were back with a vengeance. Dean made an appointment to see Balt for the first time in months.

Without even waiting for Balt to invite him to sit down, he flopped onto the couch in the now-fully-qualified psychiatrist’s office. “The dreams are back.”

“Cas doesn’t know.” It wasn’t a question.

“I don’t want him to worry. I’ll tell him if you think I should but otherwise…”

“Do you think you should?”

Dean pondered that question for a while before speaking. “I think he’s going to find out whether I tell him or not, so I need to tell him. He’s on night shift all this week but I couldn’t get away with it any longer than that.”

“I think that would be wise,” Balt agreed.

“Jess is pregnant,” Dean blurted randomly. He wasn’t sure why he said it. Sam was beside himself with excitement at the prospect of being a father. Dean could see no reason why Sam and Jess having a baby would be a bad thing.

“And?”

The words just tumbled out. “I’m kind of jealous. I never saw myself as a father but now I guess Sammy’s going to be a dad and I’m sort of realizing that maybe the idea of kids isn’t so bad, and then I think about how I don’t know if Cas would want kids - we’d have to adopt and would they even fucking _let_ us, you know? There’s still tons of people in the government who’re so anti-gay it’s not even fucking funny and… I want to talk to him about it but I don’t know how. And I don’t know if we’d handle the stress. Either of us.”

“Dean, I think you would make a fantastic father. As would Cas. If you decide that’s what you want, when you’re ready, that’s what you’ll do. You’ll find a way. Someone as bloody stubborn as you has to!”

 

Going home that night after his shift at the warehouse was the hardest thing Dean had done in a long time. The wrongness in his head was stronger than ever and the subject he wanted to discuss with Cas was terrifying.

Still.

He used one of the breathing techniques that Balt had taught him to fend off the panic attack that threatened and pulled into the driveway, parking Baby in her usual spot. Cas was still home; good - he hadn’t left early.

Forcing his feet to move, he got out of the car and walked slowly to the front door. As he pushed it open, a delicious scent wafted from the kitchen to greet him. A little more confident, he followed his nose. Cas was cooking. Dean wasn’t sure what it was but it smelled great.

“Cas,” he said.

“Dean,” said Cas.

“Have you ever thought about adopting?” they both said in unison.

Dean added, “My nightmares are back, but I’m dealing. I saw Balt today. He wants me to up my meds to see if that gets rid of them. Apart from that, I feel like we’re ready…”

“Shut up,” Cas told him with a forced smile. That was when Dean knew something was wrong.

“What is it, honey?”

“Anna’s back in rehab…”

Fuck.

She’d been clean for three years. Why now? “Are you okay? Stupid question. Can I help?”

Cas shook his head. “Mom didn’t want us to find out. As always, I can rely on Gabe to fill me in on things I have a right to know. She overdosed two weeks ago. Out of nowhere. Gabe said none of them had the smallest inkling she was using again. She’s… physically okay… but Dean… the Anna I know is gone. She’s someone else now. Someone… someone dangerous.”

“Oh, Cas.” That was all he could say. The only thing he could think to do was hug his doctor tight. Things had just started to go smoothly between Dad and Cas, and it wasn’t fucking fair that something else had to go wrong.

Anna, dear, sweet Anna… Anna, who wouldn’t hurt a fly… dangerous? It was wrong. This wasn’t happening. It couldn’t be real.

“I’ve taken the rest of the week off. Tracy said I can take more if I need to… I’ll see how I go.” Cas’s voice cracked. “I need to go… Kansas City…”

Dean nodded. “Let me come with you. Six hours is… a long time to be alone.”

“Yeah,” Cas agreed. “Let’s go… tonight… after dinner.”

Dean mentally ran through a checklist of things he needed to cancel and people he needed to call. There was time. “While you’re cooking I’ll make a few calls. I need to get the time off work, and I’m going to have to tell Sammy we can’t go to the baby shower. Also gotta cancel Baby’s detailing and scratch from the Chevy show.”

“Don’t do that,” Cas protested. “Not for me.”

“I’m not asking,” Dean said. “That would imply a choice in the matter.”

“Funny,” said Cas. “I remember saying the same thing to you right about a year ago.”

“And I remember it being exactly what I needed to hear.”

 

Dean’s voice was a low murmur in the next room, barely audible but enough to be comforting. To a point. Perhaps because Cas was an emotional mess, something in Dean’s voice told him that whatever Dean was missing, whatever had broken, the hole was getting slowly bigger.

Right then, it was just another worry to add to his turmoil, and he didn’t have the energy to spend much time thinking on it.

Gabe had broken the news gently, but Cas had instantly broken down. He’d only just gotten a handle on himself when Dean got home and still felt raw and fragile, as if a breath of air could snap him in two.

Dean came back into the kitchen, came up behind him, and kissed his neck. “You’ll be okay, gorgeous.”

“Will I?” Cas stirred the sauce he was making, trying not to notice or care that tears rolled down his cheeks.

“Hey, don’t think like that. It hurts, babe, but it gets better.” Dean offered him a blinding smile. “Speaking from experience.”

“Dean… stop. Just… just _stop_.” He didn’t know what he wanted Dean to stop, exactly. He just wanted to scream the word at the top of his lungs. It took more than a little self-control to keep his voice at a normal speaking volume. “Stop it.”

“Cas…”

“No.”

Silence fell, apart from the bubbling of the pots and the occasional hitch in Cas’s breathing. Nobody spoke. Dinner was eaten without a single word crossing the table.

 

Cas later ordered a very worried Dean to pull over, stumbling out of the car and into a ditch for his stomach to reject the small amount of dinner he had been able to eat. What should have been a six-hour journey took two days. Dean had slept cuddling Cas in the backseat of the Impala. Cas didn’t sleep at all.

Dean got lost in Kansas City. Hopelessly lost. Not even Cas knew where they were. He ended up having to enter Mom’s address in his phone’s GPS app and use that to help navigate.

Finally, they arrived. The first out the door to greet them was Gabe. The normally enthusiastic seventeen-year-old was subdued and instead of tackling Cas and Dean, stood holding his hand out for a handshake until both obliged.

“Hey, Cas,” Gabe said.

Cas said nothing.

“Hey, Gabe,” Dean replied. “Cas isn’t in the mood to talk right now.”

“Yeah,” Michael said from the front door. “He went mute last time, too. We just need to give him a few days. So our job is to keep Mom off him because God help us if she tries to get him to speak.”

 

Cas looked a little green again, Dean thought nervously as he followed the Novak family into the house. It was weird being here with no bubbly Anna to fill the silences that stretched on forever.

“This is so wrong,” Gabe said, breaking yet another endless silence. “You only posted on Facebook that Jess is pregnant like, two hours before Anna OD’d.”

Dean shot him a look that said ‘shut the hell up before I kick your ass’ but didn’t speak aloud. Nobody did.

Except Gabe. “I mean, we should all be happy, and then this happens.”

“Shut up before someone murders you,” Michael snapped.

Unnoticed by everyone but Cas, Dean flinched.

 

It was a week before Cas breathed a word. While he was awake, at least. Every single night, Dean woke several times to Cas screaming Anna’s name.

“I need you, Dean.”

Dean was dozing, but that broken proclamation pulled him to the surface. He pulled Cas into his arms and whispered, “I’m here, baby.”

“No,” Cas insisted. “I need _you_.”

Well, if that wasn’t confusing as hell, Dean didn’t know what was. “I don’t understand, Cas-”

“I’ve been waiting for a year for you to come back to me, the real you, and sometimes I think you have but it never lasts long! No, Dean, you don’t understand, normally this… this shadow of you is enough but now I need you!”

Finally it clicked. Cas was referring to whatever had broken that day when Dean had nearly killed Dad. “I don’t know how to be who I was.”

“You’re half a person, Dean. It’s not right. Ever since that night, there’s this light missing from your eyes. Sometimes it looks like it’s come back - like the other night when we both suggested kids - but never for long. You haven’t once told me you love me and we’ve been together for a _year_. Sometimes I feel like we only see each other to eat, sleep, and fuck, and it’s _wrong_ , I need more! I need _you_!”

“I’m trying… Cas…”

“No, I don’t think you are.”

Dean sat bolt upright, desperately clawing to contain his indignation. “I drove you here, stopping every thirty goddamned miles so you could puke. A six hour drive took two fucking days. I’ve cancelled a car show and a detailing I’d already paid for, I missed out on my little brother’s baby shower, I helped your brothers keep Ellen off your case so that when you spoke it was because _you chose to_ , and you _don’t think I’m trying to be who you need_?!”

“That’s not what I mean!” Cas shouted. The windows shook. There was a thump from downstairs. “I don’t need you to be perfect! I need you to be fucking _you_ for once!”

Dean’s voice shook nearly as hard as his body. “I don’t think you would like that very much.”

“Dean… Dean, for God’s sake, look at me.”

Dean looked into hard electric blue eyes.

“I don’t love the man you pretend to be. I love the man you _are_. Please… let me see that man again. I’ve waited so long…” Cas’s voice wavered pitifully. Dean’s expression softened, but the tension between his brows didn’t go away. He wasn’t sure how to make it. Cas’s breath hitched. “Dean… _please_.”

This was too much. Too damn much. Dean stood up and walked out of the room. “I’ll be back in an hour.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my god. I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry.


	17. Dean Winchester Is Home

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Writing this damn fic is such an emotional rollercoaster, I can't even tell you.
> 
> AND THINGS SEEM GOOD BUT THERE'S MORE TO COME, I did warn you guys this fic doesn't have a happy ending!

Cas’s muffled sobs shattered Dean’s heart, but he couldn’t go back in there, not yet, not now. Michael glared daggers at him as he made his way through the lounge, and Gabe just stared at him reproachfully as he passed the study.

What really killed him was when Ellen came running out of the kitchen with nothing but concern for him.

“Are you okay?”

Dean shrugged. “I don’t know. I’m going out for a while… you should… you should go to Cas. He needs his Mom.”

“No, sweetie, he needs you.”

Dean just shook his head. “I can’t be who he needs. I don’t know how.”

Tiny Ellen hugged him and stretched up to stroke his hair. “You’re so lost… you’ve always been lost. As long as I’ve known you. Some part of you is missing, but you’ll find it again. I know you will.”

“That’s why I’m heading out,” Dean said. “I need to find it. For Cas.”

 

Sitting in his car twenty minutes later, staring out at endless plains, Dean picked up his phone and called Balt.

“Angeles,” the psychiatrist answered. The familiar greeting was… almost a comfort.

“Hi, Balt.”

“Dean! Tracy told me you and Cas had gone out of town for a while. How’s it going?”

Dean swallowed hard. This was a more difficult subject than anything else he had discussed with Balthazar Angeles. “Anna’s back in rehab. When she’s done going through withdrawals, they’re going to put her in a mental hospital for the rest of her life. The Anna that Cas knew is dead. He’s… understandably very upset… but he’s going to be fine. I just… Balt… he keeps telling me I’m not enough. That something is missing in me and he’s been waiting for it to come back for a year, but he needs the old me. Now.” He grimaced. “I don’t know how to be the old me.”

“I wanted to address the post traumatic stress before this issue, but it seems you have that mostly under control now. That something that you feel isn’t there… is there. It’s just locked away. I can help you find the key, but not the lock. That’s up to you.”

“What if I don’t like what I unlock? What if Cas doesn’t like it?!” If Dean found that missing piece and slid it back into place, and then Cas didn’t love him anymore… he wasn’t sure he could survive that.

“Dean, listen to me. Finding that part of yourself again is probably going to hurt. I’m not going to lie to you. You might want to lock it away again, but it’s important that you don’t. You’ve done very well coming to terms with yourself. This is the last step. This is salvation.”

“Cas once told me that I needed to find my own salvation…” Dean mused. “I thought he was trying to push me towards religion. I didn’t believe him when he explained what he meant…”

“But you get it now?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s excellent, Dean. That’s a big step in the right direction. I believe in you.”

“Need to hear Cas say that,” Dean muttered. “Thanks, Balt. I think I know what I need to do now.”

“No problem. Keep me up to date.”

“Yeah. See ya.”

“Later.”

Inspiration didn’t come like a bolt of lightning, like everybody kept telling him it would. Instead it came in a slow, gradual creep. He sat in the car, thinking, experimenting with ideas. He wanted to take Cas away from all the pain, but running away from problems wouldn’t be constructive. He couldn’t do that anymore. He couldn’t just barrel at them head-on like Sammy did, but running from them wasn’t exactly good for him.

Something he couldn’t identify niggled at the back of his mind, the idea of an idea. He couldn’t pin it down, so he let it percolate, considering what to do, or not to do.

Cas had been his lifeline for so long now, he wasn’t sure if he was able to relax his grip and find something else to keep him out of Hell. He wouldn’t let go of Cas altogether - hell no - but maybe Cas felt stifled. Especially now. With everything going on with Anna, how was it fair for Dean to expect Cas to hold any more than his own weight?

It really wasn’t.

The idea of an idea matured to full idea status and for the first time in a year, a genuine smile spread across Dean’s face. Cas was going to like this.

 

“He’s not coming back,” Cas choked out. It was difficult to make his voice work, almost impossible, but he needed Mom to know.

“It’s only been forty minutes, sweetie. He said an hour, didn’t he?” Mom reminded him calmly, rubbing his back.

Cas tried to tell her more of his fears, but the only sound he could make was a strangled sob. Gabe offered him a sip of tea. He shook his head and fought for a deeper breath in than his body wanted to allow him. It took a couple of tremulous tries but when he finally managed it was like he’d been drowning and someone had just pulled him to the surface. A hand that wasn’t there closed around his and suddenly he knew, he just _knew_ that Mom was right, Dean would come back. It was going to be okay.

 _Thank you_ , he thought reverently. As his breathing returned to normal, three sighs of relief prompted him to pull Mom, Gabe and Michael into his arms.

 

Something had changed in Dean when he walked through the front door. Cas felt it in his presence and snapped his head up to stare. Dean wasn’t quite the Dean Cas loved, but he was a big step closer. The self-loathing had melted away from the hard planes of his face and he moved more smoothly.

“Hey,” Dean said.

“Hey…” Cas didn’t know what else to say. Dean was the most beautiful thing he’d seen in a long time. A year. The thing that had been gone was… somehow back.

“I have some paperwork for us to fill in, baby,” Dean said with a fierce smile. “And then I want you to teach me a bit about your beliefs.”

“Dean?”

“I want to try to believe. No promises. But I want to try.”

“No, I mean, what paperwork?”

And there it was.  The thing that had been missing. The thing that had come back for a second or two at a time but never stayed long. It was joy, and it was wonderful. “Application forms. Remember last week when we sort of started thinking about kids? Sam has some contacts in the adoption agency, he told me he can help us out. Streamline things. Make sure our sexuality isn’t a barrier.”

“Are…” Cas cleared his throat, glancing wildly around the room. “Are you serious?”

The joy faded. It wasn’t gone, not altogether, but watching Dean’s smile falter was heartbreaking. Dean’s voice was very quiet. “Did you… change your mind?”

“No!” Cas shouted. He blushed and looked down at the table, then repeated himself at a normal volume. “No, I just… what brought this on?”

“I figured out what I want. Balt helped. All this time I’ve been scared of the missing piece of me… afraid to go hunting for it. But I decided I didn’t want to drag you down anymore. I need to stand on my own two feet. No more running away from my problems.” Dean’s smile was blinding. “I know everything going on right now sucks, but we both need something to be happy about. To balance it out. Only being sad… it isn’t good for a guy.”

There was something else, something big. Dean’s chest swelled with it. Cas didn’t pry. “Let’s fill in those forms, then.”

 

There were, in fact, two more things Dean wanted to talk to Cas about, but he was waiting for the right time. Meanwhile, those things burned a hole in his pocket. He was unable to stop thinking about their presence.

Letting go of the last of his anger had been difficult, but it finally felt like the year-long struggle to keep going was over. He was under no illusions that this powerful joy would last - after all, part of being happy was being sad - but while it stuck around, it was wonderful. Just being able to feel this strongly was a shock to his system after such a long time of muted, suppressed emotions. He had always known he loved Cas. It stunned him now just how much.

“Stop it, Dean, I’m trying to concentrate,” Cas finally told him, pushing him away when he tried to go in for the tenth cheek-kiss in as many minutes.

 

There was only so much sickening adorableness everyone else could handle. Dean just grinned when Ellen decided to take Gabe out for dinner. Michael stopped by, but didn’t stay very long before he excused himself ‘to go visit Anna’ and fled.

Cas finished the paperwork and moved to make dinner. Dean stopped him.

“Where’s this coming from? You can’t cook.”

“I’m going to try,” said Dean, grinning again.

Predictably, an hour later, they fled the house, fire alarm screaming. Dean had damn near set the kitchen alight.

“We should get takeout,” Dean commented.

“Probably,” Cas laughed. “I’m not letting you in the kitchen again.”

“Fine by me!”

 

Half an hour later, they sat in the Impala, carefully sporking Chinese from cartons into their mouths.

Dean slipped the first thing out of his pocket. It was a small, flat jewelry box.

“For you,” he said shyly.

Cas opened it, and raised an eyebrow. “A key?”

“You can… drive Baby whenever you like.”

“Dean…” Cas nearly spilled his Chinese, only realizing the carton was tipping when Dean squawked a wordless protest.

“If you don’t get food on her seats!” Dean protested once the crisis was averted.

Cas flushed pink, and it was the most adorable thing Dean had ever seen. He leaned over to kiss Cas, who kissed him back for the first time since they’d found out about Anna. The kiss was long, slow, passionate, and very, very hot. It only ended when they both had to surface for air.

“Marry me,” Cas breathed.

Dean barked a laugh, immediately feeling bad when Cas looked away. “Hey, no, no, I was just- it’s funny because I was just about to ask you the same thing.”

Cas’s breathless, relieved laughter was the most wonderful thing Dean had ever heard.


	18. Bliss

Skyping Sam later that night, Dean couldn’t hold it in anymore. “Dude guess who got engaged?!”

“What?! Dean, that’s awesome! I’ve had this feeling Cas was waiting for something for ages-”

“We sort of both popped the question.” Dean lifted a hand so that the camera could see the ring on his finger.

Sam’s face was priceless. “Damn. I need to lift my game. Jess is having my damn baby and I still haven’t worked up the balls to make her Mrs. Sam Winchester. And here’s my big brother, engaged _and_ looking at adopting. How’s Cas coping with the whole Anna thing?”

Dean shrugged. “He’s tired all the time. I think he’d like to cry more than he’s let himself… but I think he’s trying not to upset me. I wish there was some way I could tell him that I’m okay now.”

“One good day doesn’t-”

“Sam. This isn’t one good day. This is real change. I’ll have bad days, I know that, but I feel like myself again. It’s been too damn long since I felt like _me_.”

There was a retching noise from Sam’s end and Sam made a face. “Gotta go. Morning sickness. Jess gets cranky if I don’t hold her hair back.”

“I don’t envy you that. Later, Sammy.”

 

By morning, when Dean opened his laptop and logged on to Facebook, comments and messages of congratulations had resulted in over two hundred notifications. He hadn’t even posted it on Facebook yet and everybody knew. Trust Sam.

It took him well over an hour to deal with them. Cas spent the whole hour sleeping, curled around him. He could go three weeks without logging on and not have this many messages! It was ridiculous.

There were one or two hateful, homophobic messages from people he had never spoken to. He laughed at them, blocked them, and forgot about them. Fuck the haters. He was getting married to his Cas and no one could stop them.

 

Dean had good days and he had bad days for a while, but they moved quickly from an even spread to far more good days than bad. Cas clung to the last threads of his own strength for two weeks before finally falling apart, screaming, throwing things, pummelling Dean’s chest with his fists… and Dean was just… there. His Dean stuck around through all of it, through things that would have sent angry Dean out the door for hours or even days.

He slowly realized that he had begun to think of Dean as two different people. The Dean he loved, and the angry, depressed shadow-Dean. Shadow-Dean was gone. Lurking, perhaps, but never able to smother the real Dean.

Anna overdosed again the night they committed her to the mental hospital. Nobody knew how she got her hands on the cocaine. The first anybody knew of it, she was dead on the floor.

It was a relief. The Anna the Novak family knew was dead already, and her body’s continuing life was a cruelty. It didn’t stop them - Dean included - from spending a good day and a half just hugging each other and crying.

There were more tears when Dean and Cas decided to head home. They had wedding preparations to make and Dean wanted to be in town when Sam and Jess had their baby.

Cas was driving. They’d decided to switch out every two hours and Dean had just slipped into a light doze when he felt Baby slow down and pull into a side-road.

“What’re you doing, Cas?” he asked sleepily, without opening his eyes.

Cas pulled down another short road and brought Baby to an easy stop, cutting the engine. “I want you, Dean.”

Dean spread out in his seat. “I’m yours.”

Cas got out of the driver’s seat and jogged around the front of the car to straddle Dean. “I spend hours…” He kissed Dean deeply, then continued without breaking lip contact. “Every day, just staring at you. You came home to me, Dean. You finally came home.”

“I’m home, sexy,” Dean agreed, running one hand up Cas’s back, beneath his shirt. A shiver ran down Cas’s spine and straight to his cock.

For hours, all they did was touch, still fully clothed, making each other harder and harder. Then Dean’s hands hit a sensitive spot at the back of Cas’s hips and, both gasping, they rutted against one another. Suddenly Dean’s jeans and Cas’s slacks were in the way. Their kisses turned hungry and each fumbled with the other’s fly until finally, _finally_ , the offending garments were removed.

Dean groped blindly for the lever so he could tilt his seat back, and never found it. Cas was the one to grasp the lever and push the seat and Dean’s shoulders back. He wanted to bend his fiance over the hood and pound into him until they screamed each other’s names to the heavens, but in an unusual fit of self-control, Cas decided to keep the slow and passionate feel. Foreplay slipped effortlessly into sex. This was Dean’s first time being entered. Cas was gentle and as careful as possible, prepping him slowly. One finger until Dean begged for more. Two fingers and Dean was sobbing for it before Cas inserted a third.

By the time Cas let himself enter Dean’s hole, Dean’s head was thrown back in ecstasy. It was hot, tight, and _God_ , Cas wanted to move… but he didn’t. Not until Dean relaxed, fully allowing the intrusion.

Slowly, ever so slowly, Cas pushed deeper, taking almost a full minute to bottom out. He withdrew nearly all the way, and then slid back in, increasing the rhythm slowly, just half a beat with each stroke. Dean’s fingers knotted into his hair, tugging in time with the hot slap-slap-slap of flesh on flesh.

Dean’s whimpers and moans were all Cas could hear. All his skin was hyper-sensitive; the lightest touch was half-painful but _oh!_ how the pleasure consumed him.

Nobody begged or pleaded or gave or took. As the sun broke over the horizon, they came together in an earth-shattering climax, each with a wordless shout.

Cas cleaned up the cum, helped Dean put his jeans back on, put his own pants on, and then fell asleep, snuggled against Dean’s chest with the sun warming his back.

 

“It seems like no one knows…”

Cas drifted back to wakefulness. Dean’s chest vibrated as he sang softly.

“How you’ve been feelin’...”

Dean knew. He knew that Cas wasn’t as happy as he let on… That took a weight off Cas’s shoulders. He had been wondering how to say it.

“You’re hidin’ all your hopes…”

Most of them, yes…

“You stopped believin’...”

That lyric hit Cas like a fist to the gut. He hadn’t prayed in weeks.

“It’s not over, we’re one step away…”

 _Tell me_ , he thought at Dean. _Tell me you love me_.

“We will bend but we will never- Cas?”

Cas opened his eyes at last and looked into Dean’s wonderful, soft, joyous… _worried_ green ones. “Will you pray with me tonight, baby?”

Surprise registered in those green eyes. “Of course, Cas. I was starting to worry you were losing your faith…”

Cas felt tears well up in his eyes. “I have lost it, Dean. But I’m going to get it back. For you.”

“For me?!”

“For you.” Cas hummed thoughtfully. “You’ve been wonderful. So… so wonderful. And I’ve been… well. Difficult.”

Dean didn’t deny it. “Cassy, honey, we’re gonna make vows. For better or for worse. Right?”

“Right.”

“And we’re gonna make them ‘cause I love you and you love me.”

Cas thrilled to the words. He hadn’t realized just how much he needed to hear them. “You need to say that more often, you know.”

“I will. I love you. I love you, I love you, I love you.”

Cas let out a very unmanly squeak and kissed his fiance happily. “I love you too. Let’s go home.”

“I’m already home,” Dean said. “Home isn’t a place.”

“Shut up, idiot, you know exactly what I mean!” Cas playfully slapped Dean’s shoulder and slid out of the car, only to jog around the front and sit in the driver’s seat.

“I need to let you drive more often,” Dean commented idly. “If last night is what happens when I do.”

“Dean… that song you were singing…” Cas smiled as he started up Baby’s engine and turned her around, bringing her back to the highway. “You know it’s my favorite, don’t you?”

“I know it’s your ringtone.”

 

The rest of the drive passed without conversation. Dean put on some classic rock and they sang along at the top of their lungs, often off-key but never caring. It was fun, carefree, and wonderful.

Little did they know it was to be one of their last carefree moments.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Brace yourselves, guys...


	19. This Is The End

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a shorter one, and for that, I apologize.
> 
> For the rest... I am not sorry. This was always planned. You were warned!
> 
> The last chapter is an epilogue and will be following shortly.

_Carry on my wayward son_

_There’ll be peace when you are done_

_Lay your weary head to rest_

_Don’t you cry no more_

All he could see was twisted metal. He couldn’t move and something extremely heavy was on his chest. His phone rang, and rang, and rang, and he couldn’t answer it, because he couldn’t even move to reach into his pocket.

He should have been in pain. He knew he should have been in pain, but the only thing he felt was the wrongness, the missingness, that told him he should hurt. He couldn’t remember what had happened.

He should have been afraid.

Instead, there was this strange sense of peace.

Someone very far away was screaming his name. Not his first name. Just “WINCHESTER!” over and over.

His phone started ringing again.

Time moved oddly. It could have been a second or an hour before the weight on his chest disappeared and the twisted metal was gone from his line of sight. He still couldn’t move.

Hands took his wrist, pressing two fingers in to check for a pulse.

“He’s alive!”

Of course he was fucking alive, what did they think this was, a fucking cemetery?

“Get him stable, hurry up,” another voice ordered.

The sound of running feet met Dean’s ears. He would recognize those feet anywhere. And that voice. “What happened? Is Dean okay? He won’t pick up, he won't pick up-”

The strangers - paramedics, Dean thought sleepily - lifted him carefully onto a backboard and then hauled him up.

“DEAN!”

_If we live…_

Cas’s phone was ringing…

_If we die…_

Dean felt himself fading. He wanted to hold on. He couldn’t hurt Cas, he’d promised, they were going to get married…

_We will shout out…_

“DEAN! Tell me he’s okay, tell me he’s going to be okay!”

_Our battle cry…_

The paramedics bundled Dean into the ambulance quickly, already working fast. The ambulance pulled away before the back doors were even all the way closed, sirens screaming and tires squealing.

Cas fell to his knees. “Dean,” he sobbed. “Dean!”

The world was ending, exploding, freezing, closing in around him… Cas was a trauma surgeon, he knew… he knew… those injuries… not even Harding could… it was… Cas was going to lose Dean, so very, horribly soon after getting the real Dean back.

He sobbed in the middle of the warehouse, staring at the pallet that had fallen on his fiance, and refused to move or speak or think or _anything_.

Numbness had set in by the time Sam arrived.

“Cas…”

Cas looked up at Sam, blinking stupidly.

“Come on. You can’t stay here forever.”

The house was too big and too empty without Dean. Cas wandered aimlessly, tears streaming down his face. He couldn’t make a sound if he tried.

Images of Dean’s broken body kept flashing through his mind. He stopped in the kitchen, leaning over the sink, and puked up the beers he’d downed. He vomited until only bile came up, and then a few more times until nothing was left.

He was empty. There was nothing… nothing left. Dean had wormed his way through every aspect of Cas’s life and now without Dean there was no… anything.

After another hour or two of wandering, he ended up on the floor in the lounge, curled up with Dean’s phone in his hand, keening. Suddenly, it rang. Cas leapt about a foot off the floor before answering with trembling fingers.

“Hello?”

“Cas?!” John’s surprise was jarring. Cas sat up and stared numbly at the dark TV screen.

“Yeah.”

“Is Dean with you?”

Cas couldn’t breathe. “D-don’t you know?” he choked out.

“Know…?”

“John… Dean is… D-Dean is… d-dead…”

There was silence for a very long time. So long that Cas thought John had hung up on him. Then, finally… “No… can’t be…”

“I saw him… he’s gone…” Tears started streaming down his face again. “I’m sorry… John… I’m sorry. There was nothing-” sob “-anyone-” sob “-could do.”

The funeral was on Friday. Cas hadn’t spoken since that phone call from John. He wanted to speak at the funeral, but as the mourners milled around the church, he shifted from foot to foot, picking nervously at his suit, still as unable to speak as ever.

Sam laid a hand on Cas’s shoulder. He was sharp in a freshly-pressed three-piece suit, and Jess was lovely in her black floor-length gown, very pregnant and very tearful.

“You can do this.”

Cas shook his head. He couldn’t speak. How the hell was he supposed to make a fucking speech - how was he supposed to say the eulogy - when he couldn’t find his voice?

He ended up standing next to John while John read the speech he had written.

“Dean Winchester was a lot of things. A son, a brother, a friend, a hard worker, and a wonderful man. He was taken too soon, at only twenty-three.”

Cas sobbed. It was the first sound he’d made in days.

“But in only twenty-three years he lived. He lived more than a lot of people do in eighty. When he was fifteen, he rebuilt his sixty-seven Chevy Impala from the ground up, going on to win over sixty trophies with his Baby in Chevy and classic car shows. He wasn’t afraid of a bit of hard work, or of getting his hands dirty. He never did manage to learn to cook-” John’s voice cracked, and Cas shouldered him out the way.

“But,” said Cas, “there was nothing that Dean Winchester would not try. I will never forget the way he dropped everything and drove me to Kansas City when my family was in crisis, and stayed with me. The moment we asked each other if we wanted kids. The moment we proposed to each other. I loved… everything… about Dean. He was my best friend, and I wanted to spend the rest of my life with him as much as he wanted to spend the rest of his life with me. At least one of us got his wish.” Tears streamed down his face. It was getting harder to speak, but Cas needed to say this. “We were going to adopt a child together. I still intend to. This child will know it is our child, mine and Dean’s, and it will know its second father was the most loyal, stubbornest, kindest man I have ever met. I have loved him from the moment I laid eyes on him and I will never stop. Goodbye, Dean. Rest easy. I love you.”

Sam had opted not to speak, but he and Jess were waiting for Cas with a tearful group hug.

“That was perfect,” Sam sniffled. “Thanks… for saying what I couldn’t.”

Cas nodded, mute again. He wasn’t sure he wanted to speak ever again.

 


	20. Epilogue

“Cas?”

Cas looked up blankly. John wasn’t welcome here. Nobody was welcome here. He just wanted to sit in his house and be miserable, damn it!

“I know you don’t want to talk. But Jess is in labor and they both want you there. You’d have been there… with Dean… if not for the accident.”

With a sharp intake of breath, Cas looked away. No. He didn’t want to think about Dean. He would have greatly appreciated it if people would just leave him the fuck alone.

“Come on, Cas, you can’t miss this.”

He tilted his head. Why?

“It’s important to both of them. You’re family, Cas. They want all the family there. Your mom and your brothers are already there. You’re the only one still missing.”

A raised eyebrow.

“Sam doesn’t count me. I can’t say I blame him.”

Cas had the strongest sensation of arms around him and lips at his ear. Dean’s voice told him, _You should go, babe. Can’t have you missing out on your niece's birth_.

Cas huffed and stood up shakily. He hadn’t left this chair in days, other than to relieve himself. The thought of going somewhere was terrifying. Very deliberately, he turned his head to look upstairs. _Gonna shower_.

“I’ll be waiting,” said John.

The baby was a mini-me Jess, with Sam’s lips and nose. Cas couldn’t take his eyes off her. She was beautiful.

“Do you want to hold her?”

He nodded, eyes wide, looking rather like a spooked squirrel. But when the tiny weight settled into his arms, it was right. That was his niece.

“Sam and I were throwing around some name ideas before you got here,” Jess said with a dazzling smile. “We wanted to run our favorite by you first. Cassandra Dean Winchester.”

“Cass Winchester,” Sam clarified. “The name you should have.”

Cas stared at Jess, then handed the baby back with a stiff nod. _Call her whatever you want_.

Secretly he was pleased, but he couldn’t let on. He wouldn’t.

Something about Jess’s small smile told him that she saw right through him. He bowed his head and retreated. There was too much happiness in the room.

And he was jealous. He knew he would never get Dean back, but there was one thing he could do. One thing…

When he got home he started madly cleaning and kidproofing his house. He forced himself to go back to work, initially wearing a badge that read _I am mute, please do not be offended_. Before long he was able to discard the badge.

Things were normal again. Or as normal as they could be without Dean.

And then the adoption agency contacted him. They had a baby for him, he just had to submit to the usual rigmarole.

Sam and Jess came around with little Cass not long after the papers were signed. Cas was on the couch with his baby in his arms, feeding the little guy, when the doorbell rang.

“Come in! It isn’t locked.”

“Congratulations,” Jess sang as Sam pulled a huge helium balloon out of thin air with the same message written on it.

“What’s his name?” Sam asked, crouching and making goo-goo eyes at the baby.

“His mother named him Dean,” Cas said. “I decided to keep the name. He’s legally Dean Novak now.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know if I'll write a sequel with Cass Winchester and Dean Novak. I might. We'll see.
> 
> But whatever. This is the first fic, fan or original, that I've finished in a very long time. I'm proud of myself. It felt forced in a couple of parts but it's still an achievement.
> 
> Thank you all for sticking with me.


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